


The Master of My Fate

by GreenArcher



Category: Beauty and the Beast (2017)
Genre: Alternate Universe - No Curse, Alternate Universe - Time Travel, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Arranged Marriage, F/M, Implied Sexual Content, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, POV Third Person Limited, References to Shakespeare
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-06-19
Updated: 2018-09-21
Packaged: 2018-11-15 05:23:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 9
Words: 50,650
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11224188
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GreenArcher/pseuds/GreenArcher
Summary: What if the Beast’s magic book couldn’t just transport him to different places, but to different times? Is there a way he can become human again and still earn Belle’s love? Experimental AU.





	1. Chapter 1

_She's never coming back._

The phrase reverberated in the Beast's mind like a mocking chorus as he watched Belle and Philippe disappear into the woods. He'd finally freed her after all these weeks; sent her back to her village and to her father, leaving him to suffer his fate alone once more. For in a few hours, the rose's last petal would fall, and he would be a beast, forever. There would be no more wishing, no more waiting, no more agonizing over that small chance that he _could_ be human again. Instead, he'd remain the beast he'd always been, while Belle would be blissfully reunited with her father, her experiences at the castle soon to become an unpleasant footnote at the back of her mind. Everything would be as it should be.

The Beast wanted to say that he was anguished and heartbroken over his decision to let Belle go and truly, he was all these things and more. For in the past few days, he'd genuinely believed that she _could_ have saved him. They'd formed a special connection during her time here, one that had sprung from their deepest pains and vulnerabilities; and somewhere between all the snowball fights, book-reading sessions, and relearning of basic table manners, he'd fallen helplessly in love with her. Not because she was beautiful or intelligent—although these were good reasons for _any_ man to want her—but because she was the only one who'd seen him as more than a beast. It was because of her and her unwavering kindness that he'd tried even harder to become the man she deserved.

But it was all for naught now. She was gone, never to return. And mentally, the Beast was kicking himself, wondering how he could have let his feelings blind him from seeing the truth. He'd known from the first day she'd arrived at this castle, terrified, but boldly demanding for her father's freedom, that she didn't belong here. Her mind was too bright, her spirit too free. Now that she was gone, all the Beast had left were the memories—a small ball of light to hold on to before the impending darkness swallowed him whole. It wasn't what he'd hoped for, but it was the best he could do.

He closed his eyes and let the events of the past few weeks bleed together like a blurry watercolour painting. He saw her holding Lumière up to his face, eyes as wide as dinner plates as she took in his monstrous form. He saw her in the woods after the wolf attack, draping her cloak over him as she begged him to stand so they could return to the castle. He saw her gaping at the size of his library, teaching him how to handle Philippe, wishing on the Enchantress's book to go to Paris and find out what had happened to her mother...

_The book._

The Beast opened his eyes. It was strange how little he'd thought of the Enchantress's last gift until now. In the early years of the enchantment, he'd used it to escape from the castle for hours on end; travelling to distant countries and cities he used to visit with his parents as a child. But as time passed and the disconnect between him and the outer world grew bigger, he decided to shelve the book, content to spend the rest of his days as a recluse. The last time he'd brought it out was when Belle had wanted to visit her birthplace; but seeing how unhappy the experience had made her, he'd shelved it again afterwards, never bothering to ask if she wanted to "run away" with him again. In all those instances, he'd used the book to travel to specific _places,_ but never to a specific _time._ But was it possible that it could do both? When the Enchantress had first cursed him, she'd told the Beast that the book was a way for him to go to wherever his heart desired. So, if he desired to travel back to a specific moment in his past, would the book grant his request?

He scratched his chin pensively. What did he have to lose by trying? It would only be a few hours before the last petal fell. The servants would all be downstairs, too busy mourning their master's decision to see what he was doing. He had sentenced them all to this undeserving prison—the least he could do was find another way to set them free.

Decision made, he turned away from the ledge and made his way back down the castle's many dark, spiral staircases.

* * *

As the Beast entered the library, another pang of heartbreak washed over him. Everything looked as it did the last time he'd been here with Belle. He trudged over to their table and saw that it was still cluttered with their empty glasses, books, and scrolls that they'd perused a few days earlier. He looked to the balcony and half-expected to see her emerge from the shadows, gushing about finding "the most wonderful story" that they just _had_ to sit down and read together. But of course, no one was there, and the Beast kicked himself for getting his hopes up again. After being in Belle's company for so long, he knew that her absence would take a long time to adjust to.

Happy for an excuse to distract himself, he retrieved the magic book from the cabinet beside the fireplace. He opened its metal clasps, turned to the page with the glowing map and set it on the stand on the table. Then, he placed his paw on the page, feeling a little sheepish as he thought to himself, _I wish to go back to the day I refused the Enchantress's gift._

Nothing happened. The Beast growled in frustration. Of course it wouldn't work! That bloody Enchantress had never made things easy for him. He should have known better than to wish for something that would never be.

 _Oh, you mustn't give up so quickly, master,_ said a voice in his head that sounded vaguely like Lumière. _Gather your thoughts. Think everything through_ carefully _._ He must have forgotten to do something, but what? What had he told Belle all those weeks ago?

" _Think of the one place you've always wanted to see. Now find it in your mind's eye, and feel it in your heart."_

The trouble was, the Enchantress's visit was not an experience the Beast had ever cared to see in his mind's eye or feel in his heart. On the contrary, he'd spent years trying to forget it, destroying all the portraits, mirrors and material possessions that reminded him of that night. He hadn't even set foot in the ballroom until today; so afraid that it would trigger a memory that would send him spiraling into madness.

But thinking of the servants, the Beast reluctantly allowed himself to wiggle back into the mindset of the man he'd been all those years ago. He remembered his excitement and arrogance at the prospect of throwing the most lavish ball in France, filled with the most beautiful women—the loveliest of them who'd become his concubine for the night, provided she wasn't a disappointment. It shamed the Beast to think that he'd once thought of women that way, but as he'd learned from Belle, accepting his past was one of the first steps to moving forward. He thought ahead to the ball itself and tried to picture all its details in his mind's eye; the men in black suits, the women in ornate white dresses; Maestro Cadenza on the harpsichord as Madame de Garderobe sang that gaudy aria. What were the words again? He should have remembered them since he'd been the lyricist:

 _"Oh, how divine_  
_Glamour, music and magic combine  
__See the maidens so anxious to shine…"_

Suddenly, golden stardust bled out from the Beast's fingertips on to the page. _It's working!_ He thought, heart beating wildly in his chest. He felt a familiar spinning sensation as the library faded away to reveal a starry sky filled with silver clouds. Only instead of sinking down to his destination like he usually did, the Beast remained suspended in place. He watched curiously as the night sky grew lighter, the moon descending under the horizon as the sun rose to take its place. Then, the sky grew dark again as the sun set and the moon rose once more. On and on this cycle of night and day continued, growing faster with every rotation, until the Beast had to hold out an arm to stop the flickering light from hurting his eyes. Finally, a cold blast of wind smacked him in the face and everything was motionless. The Beast was still looking at the sky, only now it was covered by dark, stormy clouds. He descended into one of them, and when the fog lifted, found himself in the West Wing, standing in the corner between his bed and the fireplace.

Except this West Wing was different from the one he'd left a few moments ago. It was no longer gloomy and ominous but filled with light. Candelabras occupied every space along the walls; making the room at least ten times brighter than usual. Suddenly, the Beast sensed movement in his peripheral vision and spun around, only to see his alarmed reflection staring back at him from a mirror. They were everywhere, he realized, these candles and mirrors, and he vaguely remembered that that was how _he'd_ wanted it at the time. For as a prince, the Beast had been so obsessed with his outward appearance, he'd turned his room into a shrine where he could admire himself constantly. He was in the West Wing as it had looked exactly five years ago. Which meant…

The Beast looked past the bed. Standing around his vanity, too absorbed in their work to notice their intruder, were his servants. His _human_ servants _._ He watched, mesmerized as they applied the finishing touches to their master's costume for tonight's supposed ball. Then, unable to contain his curiosity, he peered around the bedpost to look at the Prince himself. Oh, he was so pretentious back then. No doubt about it. He looked like a vulgar clown with all that white powder and rouge, and the gold and blue accents around his eyes reminded him of a mandrill he'd seen in a book on African wildlife once. What on earth had he been thinking? The only thing that stunned the Beast more than seeing his past self, was the revelation that he'd actually managed to _travel back in time._ The book must have taken him back to the castle less than an hour before the curse had taken effect.

The servants finished applying the master's makeup and stepped aside; save for Chapeau, who came forward to slip the Prince's grey wig over his head and dust it with a bit of powder. If the Beast remembered right, Cogsworth was going to enter the room in a few minutes and announce that it was time for him to welcome his guests. Which meant he had to act fast if he wanted to change what happened here tonight. But how?

Several scenarios played through his mind, each one more outlandish than the next. He could knock the Prince unconscious and hide him somewhere in the woods. By the time his servants found him, maybe the Enchantress would have already moved on. Or maybe he could find a way to delay the ball until the Enchantress arrived and order a servant to take her up to a room so she and the Prince would never meet.

 _But will that really solve the problem?_ The Beast knew little about manipulating time, but he had a feeling that it wasn't something to toy with lightly. He remembered that in the Greek tragedy _Oedipus Rex,_ Oedipus and his parents had spent most of their lives trying to prevent a prophecy from coming true, only for it to fulfill itself through all the things they'd done to prevent it. No, if the Beast wanted to alter his fate, he would have to do it in the least invasive way possible. He would have to stay in this room. He was going convince his younger self to change the past for him.

Slowly, the Beast stepped out from behind the bed, placing the book on the mantelpiece as he did so. He intended to sneak up on the Prince, but the room's bright lighting combined with his massive form put him at a slight disadvantage. He wasn't even a few feet away before he cast a long shadow over the vanity, causing the master and his servants to spin around in alarm. They all gazed at him in horror, or in the Prince's case, horror mixed with disgust, and the Beast seized the half-ruined moment to introduce himself.

"Good evening, Your Royal Highness," he said in his deep, baritone voice.

The reaction was instantaneous. Chapeau dropped his powder brush to the floor. Plumette screamed and grabbed Lumière's arm. Another female servant fainted. The Prince fell off his stool, and when he sat up again, the Beast was amused to see that his wig was slightly askew.

"Guards! GUARDS!" the Prince shouted at the top of his lungs. "Seize this hideous creature at once!"

The doors swung open and the Beast spun around to see two men in matching military outfits run into the room with their swords drawn. _Curious,_ he thought. _I haven't seen these men in a while._ Most of his guards had transformed into wall ornaments or inanimate suits of armour during the curse; making the castle free for intruders like Belle and her father to break and enter as they pleased. But seeing what they were up against, the guards stopped in mid run to gape at their enemy's impossible form. The Beast rolled his eyes. _Far too easy_ _._ Taking advantage of their distraction, he lifted his arms and swatted them away like they were mere flies. The guard on his left crashed into his wardrobe, while the one on his right struck his head against the bedstead. Neither of them tried to get up again; either in too much pain, or too much shock to think about going at him a second time.

Confident that he was no longer in danger, the Beast returned his attention to the Prince. "Is that the best you can do?" he asked him cockily.

His past self trembled and fell to his knees. "Oh please, monster," he pleaded. "I will give you anything you want. Only spare my life. _Please!"_

"I'm not here to kill you," the Beast replied. "I only wish to seek an audience with you." He looked up at the servants. _"Alone."_

The Prince took one glance at the Beast's killer claws and razor sharp teeth and knew that he had little say in the matter. "Leave us," he demanded, turning back to his servants.

 _"Oui maître,"_ Chapeau replied. He took a moment to revive the unconscious servant while Plumette, Lumière and the others went to help up the guards. Once everyone was on their feet again, they turned back to the master, bowed and quickly exited the room. Beast and Prince were alone at last.

The Prince shakily got to his feet. He lifted his stool and sat down again, trying to regain his composure as he asked, "You've come for my soul, haven't you? You're one of Lucifer's servants, come to drag me down to hell?" He stared at the Beast, and in the candlelight, his green-blue eyes looked fierce and accusatory. "Well I can assure you, demon, that I am a descendent of God Himself, and as such, your master has no power over me!"

The Beast rolled his eyes again. Not only did his younger self look like rubbish, but his head was clearly full of rubbish, too. It was about time that someone corrected that. "It's not hell I come from, but the future," he replied in his booming voice. "And I've come here today to deliver a warning. During tonight's festivities, an old woman will come to your castle to offer you a single rose, in exchange for shelter from the bitter storm. You _must_ accept her gift, no matter how ugly you think she is, or how ridiculous you find her offer to be. If you don't, she will reveal her true form and punish you and your servants with a terrible curse. You'll become a prisoner of your own castle and there will be no escape for you."

The Prince narrowed his eyes. "How do you know all this?"

"Because I'm your future self, you _dolt!"_ he growled, leering his ugly face at him. "I'm the Beast you'll turn into if you refuse her proposal. So if you don't fancy looking like this for the rest of your life then you'd do well to heed my word!"

The Prince blinked slowly. Then, he laughed a shrill, mocking laugh. "Old women don't go wandering into castles, turning princes into beasts," he replied. "How am I to know that this isn't a trick, and you and this old crone are conspiring to overthrow my castle?"

"You need proof that I'm you?" said the Beast, ruffling his mane in frustration. "Fine!" He paced the floor. "I know that you still have nightmares about your mother. I know that you're afraid that one day, everyone will see you for the fraud you really are. I know you can't stand the idea of ugliness, in fact just picturing it makes you sick. I know you hate it when people say that your hair colour is red instead of blonde. I know that no matter how many balls you throw, you always come out of them feeling even lonelier than before…"

The words flowed from him endlessly, like water from a broken dam. In the span of a few minutes, he revealed the Prince's innermost fears and insecurities… anything that he was sure only his past self would know about. And it seemed to be working, for the Prince grew smaller and smaller the more he listened.

"And finally," the Beast concluded, "your full name is…"  
  
The Prince let out a cry of rage as the Beast uttered his forbidden name. Its loudness could easily rival one of the Beast's roars on a good day.  _"Never_  say that name in my presence!" he said, pointing an angry finger at him. "I damned my father to hell for giving me that accursed title!"

"You'll believe me, then?" asked the Beast, raising an inquisitive brow.

The Prince slouched his shoulders and bowed his head. His formerly arrogant expression was now shaky and unsure. "If I don't let this old woman stay at my castle, then this is truly what I am to become?"

"Yes." The Beast nodded. "And the years to follow will not be kind. There will be no more music or light in the castle. No more of these extravagant parties you love to host. In fact, everyone outside your household will forget you even exist. You'll look for any form of comfort or escape, but there will be none. You will simply have to embrace a life of loneliness, with no hope of redemption."

The Prince pursed his lips into a frown. He looked even less like a proud prince now, and more like a scared little boy playing dress up. It was as though for the first—no, the second time in his life, he'd realized that his actions came with consequences. "Very well," he said decisively. "If what you say is true and this old woman comes to my castle tonight, I will graciously offer her a room." He looked back up at him. "Is there anything else you wish to tell me?"

 _Yes,_ thought the Beast. _In the town of Villeneuve, there lives an amazing young woman named Belle who will change your life. You must seek her out, bring her to your castle and…_

He bit his tongue. He was here to stop his curse, not talk about Belle. Bringing her up would only complicate matters. "I know your— _our_ father hurt and abused you," he said instead. "It's because of him that you've learned to hide your pain behind all this perfection. It's the only way you feel in control. But know this." He paused. "Only you are the master of your fate. It's never too late to change who you are. Don't let your mother's wisdom and kindness go to waste. Spend the people's taxes on the poor, not on these frivolous parties. Treat your servants with better respect. And in time, you may finally find the happiness you desperately crave."

Another uncomfortable expression crossed over the Prince's face. The Beast had told him what he already knew but had been too selfish to act upon. "It's difficult to turn your back on something you've known your whole life," he remarked quietly.

"You'll figure it out. Believe me, anything is easier than looking like this."

A knock on the door startled the Prince and Beast from their conversation. "Master, are you well?" Cogsworth called from the corridor. "Your guests have arrived. They're all asking about you."

"Five more minutes, Cogsworth!" the Prince shouted back. He looked in the mirror and cringed at the sight of his crooked wig and smudged makeup. "I need to get ready for this party," he told the Beast, grabbing a brush to fix up the damage. "I suggest you make yourself scarce before my servants return. My guests won't approve of me keeping a beast inside my castle. Even if that beast is technically my future self."

"Oh, believe me, I have no intention of staying," the Beast replied. "I've already seen what happens here tonight. Now it's up to you to change it."

He walked back to the fireplace and recovered the magic book from the mantelpiece. As he flipped through its pages, he looked back at the vanity to see the Prince staring blankly at his reflection as he added more powder to his face. He had a feeling that tonight's incident would weigh on his mind for a long time.

Once he found the page with the map on it, the Beast placed his paw on the book, closed his eyes and thought of the present.

* * *

When the spinning subsided and the Beast opened his eyes, he found himself back in the library. Like the West Wing, its appearance had changed. There were no books on the table. There was a fire burning in the hearth. And although it was nighttime, the room seemed lighter somehow, like a dark shadow that had lingered here for years had finally lifted itself.

Intrigued, the Beast looked down at the Enchantress's book, then dropped it with a start. He'd expected to see paws holding up the map, but instead, he saw hands. Smooth, human hands. He held them up in disbelief, then turned them around. Ten fingers with ten perfectly filed nails looked back at him. His heart drummed painfully against his ribcage. Could it be? Was it really possible?

He raced to the closest window and looked at his reflection. A man's face, his _real_ face stared back at him in shock. He placed his hands on his cheeks, amazed to feel soft skin there in place of fur. He patted his chest, marvelling at how much smaller it was now that he was human. He wore no wigs or makeup, and in place of a garish suit, was dressed in a light green dressing gown and a white night shirt. Like he'd wandered in here before bed to do some late-night reading.

The only thing that astonished the Prince more than seeing his human self, was seeing the changes to the castle grounds. For the surrounding forests were no longer covered in snow, but rich with fresh grass and lush leaves. Summer, which had been absent from the castle for years, was now at its peak. Meaning… the Enchantress's curse had never come to pass. The Beast had saved himself from his own cruel fate.

He let out a vivacious laugh which echoed across the library, not caring who was around to hear. It had been too long since he'd last heard his human voice, too long since he'd felt such immense joy and relief. Now that he was free, he couldn't wait to tell Belle and…

Except Belle still wasn't here. Remembering this, the Prince's laughter faded. He'd almost forgot. In fact, in this timeline, he and Belle would have never crossed paths at all. For it was out of vengeance that the Beast had imprisoned her father, and because of his imprisonment that Belle had come here to find him. Without these events, Belle was probably still living in Villeneuve, still reading that clergyman's same ten books over again, and still stuck in that naïve mindset that _Romeo and Juliet_ was the best play in the world. Then at night, she would lie awake, wondering what had become of her mother and why she couldn't fit in with the other villagers in her provincial town.

 _But you_ could _change that,_ said a nagging voice at the back of his head. Belle had had plenty of reasons to refuse his dinner invitation during her first night here. But surely it would be a lot harder for her to refuse an invitation from a prince? He could make up an excuse; tell her that he needed her and her father's services for some task at the castle, which would require them to stay here for several months. Then in time, the Prince would open up to her and court her the way he should have all those weeks ago. With none of the time constraints of the original curse, they would have plenty of time to get to know each other.

But even as he imagined this hopeful scenario, another, different image to mind. It was one of Belle standing next to him in her yellow gown, a questioning look on her face as she asked, _"Can anyone be happy if they aren't free?"_

The Prince bowed his head. In all their conversations about dreams and freedom, Belle had always spoken of a desire to visit far off places and go on exciting adventures like the characters in her books. Even if she agreed to work here of her own volition, who was to say that in a few months, she'd grow tired of him and castle life and want to pursue those ideals again? As a Prince, he couldn't abandon his duties to travel with Belle to all the places she wanted to see, as much as he wanted to. Maybe through that impasse, they would eventually part ways, taking him back to where he'd started. _No, I've already wasted her time once_ , he resolved. It would be wrong of him to do it again, even if it was in another universe. Tonight, in the old timeline, he'd given back her freedom. Now he'd erased all her memories of him and her imprisonment. It was the last gift he'd ever give her.

And in the meantime? If the Prince would have to learn to live without Belle's love, so be it. Remembering the lessons she'd taught him, he would strive to be a better man instead. And he'd start by fixing whatever mistakes his past self had created.

With a deep breath and heavy heart, the Prince picked up the Enchantress's gift and tucked it under his arm. He then turned on his heel and made his way back to the West Wing for the night. Everything was as it should be.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was inspired to write this fic after reading an [article](http://www.businessinsider.com/beauty-and-the-beast-magic-book-2017-3) from Business Insider, outlining some of the problems with the Beast's portal book in the new film, including the vagueness of its powers and how it's unclear if it can only take the Beast to specific places, or if it can also travel to specific times. This idea, combined with my interest in contemporary time travelling stories like Eric Bress's _The Butterfly Effect,_ Don't Nod's _Life Is Strange_ and J.K. Rowling's _Harry Potter and the Cursed Child,_ made me want to try my hand at writing my own time travelling AU where the Beast uses the portal book to go back in time and stop his curse from happening.
> 
> As I've mentioned in my summary, I have ideas for where I could take this concept as a multi-chapter fic, but the full story may end up being very different from this one-shot, which is why I'd consider this work to be more of a conceptual stand-alone piece than a first chapter. Time travel stories are difficult to write well because you have to plot out several universes and know your characters' life stories like the back of your hand, and I'm honestly hesitant to take on a such a big project now when I have real life to focus on. ~~And considering how little chemistry there was between Belle and Beast in the remake, I'm convinced that this ending would be slightly better for them anyway.~~ But with this one-shot, I've planted a little seed for the future at least.
> 
> A special thank you to 3431jess, CarolNJoy, Julie_Jeanette and TrudiRose of the Bittersweet and Strange forum for previewing my first draft and offering me their feedback. Do check out their stories if you have the time!


	2. Chapter 2

He woke early the next morning to bright sunlight filtering in from the far windows of his bedroom. He immediately groaned and pulled his pillow over his head, trying to block out the irritating light. 

_It was a dream,_  he told himself firmly.  _I dreamt that I used the magic book to go back in time and convince myself to let the Enchantress into the castle so I could be human. When I open my eyes, I'll still be cursed and Belle will be back home with her father._

Suddenly, there was a loud knocking on the doors.  _And there's Cogsworth, about to give me today's "morning report,"_ he thought with a sinking heart. Just the idea of facing him made him want to burrow his head deeper into his pillows. Maybe if he pretended he was dead, he would go away. He wasn't sure he could face his staff ever again, knowing he'd failed them all.

But then, it dawned on him. If the spell really  _was_  permanent now, no one should be capable of knocking on his door, period. The Enchantress had made her conditions very clear. If the Beast failed to break his spell in time, his servants would lose their conscience minds and become inanimate objects forever. The only way someone could be knocking on his door right now was if the spell had reversed itself. Or if Belle had returned...

He quickly pulled his head out from his pillows and opened his eyes. The West Wing had changed again. It was cleaner and brighter now, and his furnishings were arranged slightly differently than they were last evening. He instinctively looked to the windows, only to see that the enchanted rose was missing. He then shifted his gaze to the mattress, where he saw the corner of the Enchantress's book peeking out from his blankets, next to his very human hand.

His eyes widened in realization. Last night  _hadn't_  been a dream after all! He really had changed the past. Meaning he was still living here, as a human, in this altered timeline...

Another round of knocking broke the Prince from his reverie. Now that he knew last night wasn't a dream, his curiosity to know who was at the door quickly increased. He carefully slid the book back under his blankets and sat up from the bed.

"Come in," he called out to his visitor.

The doors opened. Into the room stepped a woman in a regal white and yellow dress, her hair skillfully woven into an elegant updo. She turned to face the Prince, and his mouth dropped open in shock. For the face that stared back at him was the face of someone who was no longer of this world; the face of someone  _undead._ Except she carried none of the traits of the undead creatures the Prince had read about in mythology and folktales. In fact, the only physical qualities that separated her from his childhood memories of her were age-related. Her once blonde hair had now dimmed to a golden brown, and there were faint wrinkles on her face. But even with these small imperfections, she was still very beautiful.

Seeing him lying there, the Prince's mother smirked. "Still in bed, are you? I should have known."

He continued to gape at her, at a complete loss for words. "M-Mère?" he said at last.

"Yes, it's me, my love. Did you really think I'd let you sleep in on such an important day?"

A part of the Prince wanted to ask exactly  _what_  was so important about today. But his dead mother's seemingly normal appearance here had taken priority.

"But I don't understand," he rambled on. "You died of consumption thirteen years ago! I saw you on your deathbed. Everyone said you wouldn't wake up."

If this was a dream, which he was sure it was by now, he expected that this would be the part where his mother would reveal herself to be an evil spirit or another enchantress come to test him. Instead, her expression softened into one of sympathy. Then, as though it were normal for her son to deny her existence every morning, she stepped closer to him and said, "Oh my poor dear.  _Of course_ I didn't die of consumption! I've been here for you this whole time. I've  _always_  been here. You must have been having another nightmare."

An uneasy chill ran down the Prince's spine. He knew for a fact that this was a lie, and had several memories to prove it. He opened his mouth to share them all but found it impossible to speak. As he quickly realized, it was much harder to tell someone they were supposed to be dead when they were standing there, looking very much alive and smiling at him so lovingly.

"Well… I don't know," he confessed instead. "I think I might still be dreaming."

The Queen laughed at that. Then, she wrapped her arms around him affectionately, her body warm and smelling faintly of roses. "Oh my love," she cooed. "I know you're nervous about today, but I'm sure that you and the Princess will get along just _fine._ I wouldn't have picked her out for you if I didn't think you'd be a good match."

"Wait.  _Who_ are we talking about now?"

"Goodness me!" She pulled away from him in concern. "You really are a scatterbrain this morning, aren't you? I'm talking about your intended, Amandine de Lanzac, of course! The princess you're going to marry next week?"

 _I'm getting married?_ The Prince widened his eyes in shock. Of course, he knew that a marriage wasn't an entirely illogical route for him at this point in his life. As the sole child of his late father, he knew he'd have to extend his family's lineage sooner or later. He just never imagined it would happen so  _soon,_ especially considering that he was still recovering from the nightmare of being a Beast for half a decade. He looked back at his mother, wanting to voice his impressions, but seeing the concerned look on her face, changed his mind again.

"Oh, of course," he lied. "I was merely testing  _your_ memory, Mère. It would be a pity if you brought the wrong princess over for such an important meeting."

She tilted her head to the side. "That was a joke, wasn't it?"

"Of course it was!"

She let out a melodious laugh. The Prince, feeling awkward, forced himself to join her. He had to admit that it was strange, but oddly delightful to laugh with someone he thought he'd never see again. But no amount of jesting could dispel his unease about his present circumstances. In the span of a few minutes, he'd learned that his mother was somehow alive again, and he was arranged to be married. What else had he changed by avoiding the Enchantress's curse last night?

The doors opened again and in came Cogsworth, accompanied by a flock of the Prince's personal servants. He assumed they were his servants anyway, for he didn't recognize most of their faces.

"Ah, good morning Your Majesties," Cogsworth said, acknowledging the Prince and his mother with a courteous bow.

"Good morning Cogsworth," the Queen replied. "And how are the preparations coming along for our guests this morning?"

"Just peachy, mistress. Tonight's dinner is sure to be an unforgettable delight. Chef Cuisinier is cooking up several regional dishes and adding his own 'oomph' to them so they'll really stand out to our guests. All that's left is to decide on which napkins to use for the dinner table."

"I can help you with that. Shall I leave my son in your staff's good hands while I go and review the selections?"

"Absolutely, mistress. We'll get him ready straight away."

The Queen bent down and kissed her son lightly on the cheek. "I'll see you downstairs shortly, my love. Remember to smile and have courage."

Once she left the room, Chapeau served the Prince a tray of hot breakfast, which he barely had time to finish before his servants whisked him out of bed to prepare him for his intended's meeting. They stripped him of his sleepwear and put him in a white shirt with frilly sleeves, a green silk jacket with metallic threads and dark, knee-length breeches.

 _Guess I'm still going through my "green phase" in this timeline,_ the Prince concluded as he examined the finished ensemble in the mirror. Not that it was a bad outfit, but seeing it on him somehow made him nostalgic for the blue suit he'd worn when he danced with Belle last night. The one he'd left in the old timeline.

"Chapeau?" he asked his valet as he sat him down at the vanity to brush his hair.

"Yes, master?"

"Last night—I mean, five years ago, before I hosted that big debutante ball in the castle—do you remember someone coming into the West Wing to see me? Somebody… unexpected I mean."

"Hmm. Depends on what you mean by 'unexpected,' master," the valet replied. "I seem to recall that there were many young ladies who were dying to a have a  _tête à tête_  with you; pardon the expression."

The Prince shook his head. "It's not a woman I'm talking about, but a man. A man with a bit of a…  _beast-like_ disposition if you know what I mean."

Chapeau looked as though the Prince had just spoken to him in a different language entirely. "Erm… I'm afraid not, master," he confessed, tying his hair back with some black ribbon. "But then again, I can't say my memory of that day is the greatest. All I know is that it was a very busy day for everyone involved. You wanted nothing but perfection for your mother's celebration ball, welcoming her back to France after her eight-year retreat to Guadeloupe. Why do you ask?"

"Uh… no reason," the Prince replied. But internally, the wheels in his head were turning. If Chapeau's memories of the ball had been overwritten with a celebration of his mother's return from Guadeloupe, that must have meant his memories of the Beast had been erased too. But who had erased them? The Enchantress? All the Prince knew was that something pivotal had occurred in the time he'd travelled back and forth in time, and now the only person who seemed to really remember the Beast's visit and his mother's death was him.

Cogsworth re-entered the West Wing and announced that it was time for the Prince to come to the drawing room to welcome his guests. Still disoriented, but sensing it would be out of character for him to refuse, he followed the majordomo downstairs.

* * *

He found his mother waiting for him outside the drawing room doors, eyes gleaming in excitement. She shot him an encouraging smile as Cogsworth stepped into the room to announce them to their visitors.

"Ahem. May I present Her Majesty, Queen Marie-Henriette de Bauffremont, and her son, His Royal Highness, Prince Thomas-Alexandre Adam de Bauffremont."

The Prince tried his best to hide his discomfort at hearing his old name as he followed his mother into the room. He hadn't gone by that title in nearly eight years—clearly not enough time for it to lose its cringe-factor. At the very least, he hoped that his current self still preferred to use it as a formality instead of a casual name. He hadn't heard anyone call him by it directly yet, so he assumed that was the case.

In the drawing room stood a middle-aged man in a grey suit, and a much younger lady, who the Prince assumed was the Princess. She was a very pretty girl. Not as pretty as Belle, and not to the same high standards of beauty as the women he used to invite to his private balls, but pretty, nonetheless. Her long mahogany-coloured hair was pinned behind her head in a partial updo. Her eyes were hazel and almond-shaped and seemed to study him with intense curiosity as he approached her. She wore a magenta dress which lacked the embellishments that were all the rage in the French courts but looked flattering on her just the same.

Once they were close enough, the Princess smiled demurely at her fiancé and lowered herself into a perfect curtsey. "It is a pleasure to meet you, Your Highness," she said. Even her voice was fitting for nobility, soft and carefully modulated.

"The pleasure is all mine, Princess Amélie," the Prince replied with a bow.

 _"Amandine,_  my dear, not _Amélie!"_  Henriette hissed from behind him. Seeing how concerned the Princess's chaperone looked, she quickly added, "Do forgive my son, Your Majesty. His memory this morning is a little shaky on account of his nerves."

"Ah," the nobleman replied in understanding. "The same with my Amandine. She spent the better part of our trip here deciding on the best way to present herself."

Amandine's cheeks turned a dull shade of pink.

"Why don't we sit down?" Henriette suggested. "You both must be exhausted from your journey."

After Plumette had laid out the tea and biscuits, she curtsied and exited the room, leaving the two families alone to chat. The Prince tried his best to look engaged as his mother asked Amandine and her father, François, questions about their journey and life back in their home kingdom of Claircomble. She and François led the bulk of the conversation, so apart from the occasional head nod or grunt of sympathy, the Prince didn't have to talk very much. At first, he found this to be a relief being that he'd been out of conversational practice for nearly five years, but as time passed, began to grow restless. After years of being able to walk freely around his castle, he wasn't used to sitting still for long periods of time.

Eventually, he leaned his elbow against the armrest next to him, glad that everyone was too engrossed in their discussion to notice his impropriety. His eyes began to wander around the room. Just above the mantelpiece was a portrait of him and his mother that looked to have been painted quite recently. In it, they were wearing matching purple outfits and looked very happy together. He then looked to the sofa across from him where Princess Amandine sat with a saucer and teacup in hand. Unlike the Prince, she kept her back as straight as an arrow as she listened to Henriette and François's conversation. He tried to get a sense of her personality by studying her countenance, but it was difficult, for she seemed skilled in hiding herself behind a mask of polite interest at all times. But he did notice that she liked to raise her pinky finger whenever she drank from her teacup. Just like a typical princess would.

"I sense my son is getting bored," Henriette said suddenly, startling the Prince from his pondering.

"What?" He looked back at her in alarm. "No I'm not!"

"Oh please!" She waved her hand dismissively. "I know that face when I see it. You're not obligated to listen to us 'old people' ramble on about municipal taxes all morning you know! Why not take Princess Amandine outside and show her the gardens?"

The Prince turned back to his fiancée. "Would you like to see the gardens, Princess?"

Amandine set down her teacup and nodded. "I would like that very much, Your Highness."

"It's settled then." Henriette clapped her hands together. "My son will show Princess Amandine the grounds, and then we'll meet back in here at noon for luncheon."

* * *

The warm summer breeze almost felt surreal to the Prince after living in eternal winter for five years. Once he stepped outside, he took a moment to soak it all in—the buzzing of insects, the smell of the fresh air, the rich greenery of the lawns and hedges—before turning to look back at the castle. It was completely white and intact now; a stark contrast to the shadowy ruin he'd lived in only a day ago. Just another explicit reminder that he now lived in an uncursed world, where instead of finding true love, marrying a princess was his top priority.

"Your Highness?" said Amandine, breaking the Prince from his thoughts.

"Huh?" He looked back at her in a daze.

"I was just saying, you have a lovely castle."

"Oh." He rubbed the back of his head, embarrassed that he hadn't been listening. "Thank you, Princess. But um... I'm sure your estate in Claircomble is just as lovely."

"Well,"—she lowered her head bashfully—"I wouldn't say that exactly."

"Oh?"

"A castle surrounded by a four-hundred-year-old moat doesn't offer the same benefits as a forest," she elaborated. "The view doesn't look half as nice either. I imagine you must have an abundance of game to hunt in these parts as well."

He shrugged. "I suppose. We do have the wolves to worry about though."

 _"Wolves?"_  She looked back at him, eyes wide with alarm.

"Yes. Wolves," he repeated. "Nasty things. They always travel in packs and won't hesitate to bite your head off if you're not careful. But, uh… they usually only come around here in the wintertime," he added tactfully, noticing how pale the Princess's face was turning. "They move further out West in the summer."

"Oh." Amandine relaxed slightly at that. "Well, they certainly sound dangerous. Still, I wouldn't mind seeing a glimpse of such a creature myself—provided it was from a safe distance. That's one thing my father never let me do back in Claircomble you see: go hunting with him. He always said it was an improper pastime for a young lady." She fiddled with her brown hair self-consciously. "I'm not talking too much, am I? I know it's not very becoming for a princess to be talkative. I can stop if you like."

"Of course not! It's a  _conversation_. We're getting to know each other. You can talk as much as you like."

She blushed and smiled at him in relief. "Thank you, Your Highness. I greatly appreciate that."

The Prince continued to exchange small pleasantries with his intended as he showed her around the castle hedge mazes. He could tell, based on her manner of speaking, that she had little to no experience courting members of the opposite sex. Her phrases, while eloquent enough, lacked the coquettishness and ambiguity that was so common with the ladies of the court. Instead, the subjects she spoke of were simple, juvenile but genuine in nature. Not that the Prince saw that as a bad thing—far from it! While he still was on the fence about marriage, he knew that given the choice, that he would rather marry an honest princess than a two-faced one.

At last, they reached the colonnade at the edge of the castle grounds, which guarded the Prince's prized white rose bushes.

"My goodness!" Amandine said as she stepped inside to look around. "Are those really roses up on those vines? I've never seen them so white before. They're beautiful."

The Prince said nothing. His eyes were fixed on the empty bench at the center of the colonnade, lost in a not-so-distant memory...

_"I never thanked you for saving my life," Belle said, looking up at him with a sheepish grin on her face._

_"Well, I never thanked you for not leaving me to be eaten by wolves," he replied._

_She giggled at that. Suddenly, they heard an echo; shouts of laughter coming from inside the castle. The servants, it seemed, were having a nice fête._

_"They know how to have a good time," Belle noted._

_"Yes," the Beast agreed. "When I enter the room, laughter dies."_

_"Me too. The villagers say I'm a 'funny girl.' I'm not sure they mean it as a compliment."_

_"I'm sorry." He bowed his head in sympathy. "Your village sounds_ terrible."

_She snorted. "Almost as lonely as your castle."_

"Your Highness?" said Amandine, bringing him back to the present. "Are you alright?"

"Call me Adam," he replied absently.

"Adam? But I thought your name was—"

"I know what my name is!" he snapped, turning back to her.

She instantly jumped backwards, shrinking away from him in fright. He realized his mistake a second later.

"Sorry," he apologized, ruffling the back of his hair self-consciously. "It's just that... my name is a bit of a delicate subject. My father gave me three names, but Adam was the only one I ever felt was my own. And it's the only one I'm really comfortable going by, to be honest."

"I... understand," Amandine said softly. "Forgive me. I shouldn't have assumed..."

"You didn't assume. You just didn't know."

An uncomfortable silence fell between the two of them. Then, Amandine took a tentative step towards the Prince and said, "Your High—I mean, Adam? If I may be so bold… before I came to your castle, I heard certain…  _rumours_ from my cousins about your past reputation. I was wondering if there was any truth to them or not."

"What were these rumours?" Adam asked curiously.

"Well." She paused. "For one, they say that you used to host a lot of parties. And you used to invite the most beautiful people from all over the world to attend them. Especially...  _women."_  She looked back at him with an uneasy expression on her face. "Is that true?"

It was the Prince's turn to look uncomfortable. One of the rare benefits to his curse was that it had erased all his subject's memories of him, including their memories of the materialistic lothario he used to be. But in this universe, he still had to bear those old scars, playing a further impact in how his future spouse would think of him.  _Way to go, you dolt,_  he thought, sending a curse out to his younger, powder-faced self.

"It is true," he admitted. "I did host a lot of parties when I was younger. But after a while, I stopped."

She looked at him curiously. "Why?"

"Because..." He paused, trying to think of a convincing story with what little information he knew about himself in this universe. "I realized that they never really made me happy. The women, the fancy costumes, the music. It was all for show. What I was really wanted was a connection—someone I could truly be happy around. But it wasn't until Be—I mean,  _my mother_  returned from Guadeloupe that I realized, maybe I didn't have to look outside to find that happiness, but inside, with my family."

"My mother has always meant the world to me," he went on. "But I didn't know how much I missed her until she came back home. After that, I stopped throwing the parties, realizing it was better to spend that time connecting with someone who really mattered than several people who didn't. I've been a happier man ever since."

The Princess smiled. "It sounds like you and your mother are very close. She must be very lucky to have you."

"Thank you." He stared wistfully back at the bench before suggesting they return to the castle to join their parents for luncheon.

"So, Amandine," he said once they were a safe distance away from the colonnade. "Tell me a bit about yourself. Do you have any hobbies? Singing? Dancing?  _Reading?"_ he added hopefully.

"Well, I do like to read... a little," Amandine replied, flattered that Adam was inviting her to talk about herself. "But what I love the most is the arts. Painting and music. Especially the opera." She looked back at him. "Do you like the opera, Your Hi—Adam?"

He thought back to a time he'd watched an opera by Grétry when he was seventeen and frowned. He remembered little of the performance since he'd been fixated on eating a delicious bowl of pastries for the most of it. "Not terribly," he replied. "No."

The Princess lowered her head in disappointment.

"But uh… our court composers, Maestro Cadenza and his wife, Madame de Garderobe are both exceptional musicians," he added discreetly. "I'm sure they'd be honoured to perform some of your favourite arias for you if you wish."

She smiled. "That would be lovely. I'd love to hear them sometime."

* * *

After many long hours of entertaining Amandine and her father, the two guests finally retired for the night, leaving Adam with uninterrupted alone time at last. Once he'd retrieved the magic book from the West Wing, he made his way back to the library to do some late-night reading. Now that he knew he'd succeeded in changing the past, his mind was buzzing with questions about his mother's inexplicable resurrection, the nature of the Enchantress's book and time travel itself. Had he really visited himself last night? If so, how could there be two of him, and where was the other version of him now? If time only moved in a forward direction, how was he able to travel back to the past, and then back to the present so fluidly? Who really  _was_ the Enchantress, and how was she able to bring back the dead and give away relics capable of controlling time itself?

Eager to know the answers, the Prince took to the shelves, pulling out books by philosophers like Aristotle, Plato, Socrates, Descartes, and Rousseau. Some of them talked about time being a strictly human concept, but none of them could offer insights into how humans could manipulate it, or what would happen if they did. The Prince sighed in frustration. If only Belle was still here to help him _._  She'd always had a knack for finding the most interesting books in this library, and he'd had  _years_  to browse through everything before her arrival.

Tired of reading through the same Socratic dialogues, Adam put the books aside and returned his attention to the Enchantress's gift. Driven by a sudden burst of curiosity, he flipped to the page of the map, placed his hand over the parchment and closed his eyes.  _I wish to go back to the night I danced with Belle,_ he thought. He let the images of last night fill his mind's eye: the ballroom scrubbed clean and lit with hundreds of candles, Belle's dress floating around her like a golden halo as he twirled her around the dance floor, Cadenza playing an uplifting waltz on his keyboard accompanied by various enchanted brass and string instruments carved into the walls...

But nothing happened. The Prince was still in the library.

He tried again, this time thinking of a different memory: the night his mother had returned from Guadeloupe. Once again, nothing happened. It seemed that the book could only take him to events that occurred in this timeline or events he had an emotional connection to. As he had no memory of his mother's return, the book was unable to take him there.

Discouraged by this revelation, Adam set the book back on the table. As he did, he noticed a fragment of text on the page behind the map.  _That's strange,_ he thought. The book had never had words in it before. He'd examined it for years, and every single page was blank, except for the two pages with the atlas on it. He turned over the map and read intriguingly:

_Once upon a time, in the hidden heart of France, a handsome young prince lived in a beautiful castle. Although he had everything his heart desired the Prince was selfish and unkind. He taxed the village to fill his castle with the most beautiful objects and his parties with the most beautiful people._

_Then one night, an old beggar woman arrived at his castle seeking shelter from the bitter storm. As a gift, she offered the Prince a single rose. Although the Prince was repulsed by the old woman's appearance, he took pity on her decrepitness and offered her a room to stay in for the night. The stranger was pleased with the Prince's offer and let her outward appearance melt away to reveal a beautiful enchantress. She explained to the Prince that she had really come to the castle to test him, as she had heard from many of his reputation as a cruel and avaricious tyrant. But seeing that he had shown sympathy for her plight instead of disgust, she was willing to reward him by granting him his heart's deepest desire._

_The Prince thought long and hard over the Enchantress's offer. He already had everything he wanted, so what more could he wish for? But then he recalled his dear mother who he'd lost to an illness many years ago and loved more than anyone else in the world. He asked that the Enchantress use her magic to bring her back to him._

_The Enchantress smiled sadly at the Prince's request. "I'm afraid my dear prince," she said, "that although I have many powers, recalling the dead is not one of them."_

_"Are you an enchantress or not?" was the Prince's scoffing reply. "I asked you to bring my mother back, and now I_ demand  _that you grant me my wish!"_

_Once more, the Enchantress repeated her statement, but the Prince was adamant. Finally, she offered him a compromise. Instead of resurrecting his mother, the Enchantress would use her magic to create a replica of the Queen, with all the same mannerisms, memories and appearance that the Prince's mother had had in life. The only major difference was that this Queen would have no memories of dying from an illness. Instead, the Enchantress would fill her mind with false memories of staying in the Southern colonies for eight years to recover from her sickness. To further solidify this story, the Enchantress also promised to place a powerful spell over the whole kingdom, so all the Prince's subjects would believe in the same tale._

_The Prince was greatly pleased with this arrangement. For with the Enchantress's magic and ability to alter his subject's memories, it would be as though his mother had never passed away._

_But before the Enchantress completed her transaction, she left the Prince with a warning. Although her magic was indeed powerful, it was not eternal. Eventually, there would come a day when the magic would end, and the Prince would find himself mourning his mother's death a second time. While the Enchantress understood the Prince's pain, no replica of the Queen could ever replace the one he had lost. Sometimes it was best to move on and accept grief as a normal part of the human condition._

Suddenly, Adam heard the door to the library open followed by footsteps. He quickly hid the Enchantress's gift among the book pile just as his mother, or rather, his imposter mother, appeared around the corner.  _Speak of the devil_.

"I didn't expect to find you here," she said with a smile. "What are you reading?"

"Oh,"—he shrugged—"just some books…"

She bent down to examine the cover closest to her. As she did, the Prince studied her closely, trying to find a flaw in her appearance that coincided with the story he'd read, but there was nothing. If the Enchantress really had replicated his mother, then she had done so to a tee.

 _"Plato's Symposium_? _"_ she said. "I didn't know you were into philosophy."

"Well it's never too late to start a new hobby," he replied pointedly.

"I suppose not." Her blue eyes stared at him pensively for a moment. "There's something... different about you today."

"What do you mean?"

"Oh, I don't know." She shook her head dismissively. "You just seem... off, somehow. You talk and hold yourself differently. And I noticed you were very withdrawn all through dinner today too. Is there something on your mind? The Princess?"

"Oh no!" Adam insisted. "Princess Amandine's fine, Mère. She's a very polite and sweet girl. I'm sure she'll make a fine… wife," he finished lamely.

"Something else then?" She sat down in the chair across from him. "You know you can tell me anything, Adam."

For one long second, the Prince wondered if it was best for him to be out with the truth. He tried to compose an explanation in his head:  _"Actually 'Mère,' I just wanted to tell you that I come from another universe where you died, and I got turned into a hideous Beast by an enchantress because I refused to let her into the castle. Obviously that left me miserable and mentally scarred for several years until I discovered this magical transportation book she'd left me, and used it to go back in time to change the past so I wouldn't be a beast anymore. Oh, and by the way, you're not really my mother, and I'm not really your son. I'm just an alternate version of your son possessing his body, since I used the book to escape from my original timeline."_

Alright, so maybe that _did_ sound a bit crazy. Thinking about it further, perhaps his mother-imposter would misinterpret his story as an excuse for him to back out of his marriage to Princess Amandine by pretending he was from another universe. Even though she wasn't really his mother, she still had her title and influence, and could choose to quarantine Adam or send him away if she thought his sanity was at risk. If he was sure of one thing, it was that he hadn't changed the past to become a prisoner  _again._

"How did you feel when you married Père?" he asked her instead.

Imposter Henriette's whole aspect changed at once. A wistful expression fell across her face. "Nervous, of course," she admitted. "I wondered if he would be handsome or as loving as the men in my fairy tales. He wasn't exactly the Prince Charming I imagined him to be, but we both respected one another which was important. And he gave me you. I know I wouldn't take that back for anything."

She looked back at him and smiled. "Oh, my son. I know that those years you had to live without me were… difficult, but I have to say, I couldn't be prouder of the man you grew up to be. Just as I couldn't be happier that I could live long enough to watch you settle down and get married."

She reached over the desk and pinched him on the cheek. Adam smiled sheepishly in response.

He knew he had a good life here. He wasn't a cursed beast anymore, forever doomed to live in the shadows of a careless mistake he'd made. True, it was a bit unsettling to be living with a copy of his deceased mother, but the Enchantress had captured her likeness quite accurately, and she was useful to have around while Adam was still readjusting to being human. And while the Prince's relationship with Princess Amandine wasn't love at first sight, he hadn't exactly fallen head over heels in love with Belle the first time they'd met either. Who was to say, after he'd spent more time with the Princess, that he might develop feelings for her, too? True she didn't have Belle's strong-willed independence or outspokenness, but she was polite and cultured—hardly reasons for a suitor to find fault with her.

He'd left Belle to live her own life, and now he was free to live his. What more could he have wanted?


	3. Chapter 3

The next few days dragged along in a slow and unremarkable fashion. Adam passed the time by relearning old hobbies he'd abandoned as a beast, like fencing, playing chess and horseback riding. He couldn't deny that he enjoyed having the freedom to ride into the woods whenever he wanted, without dwelling on who and what he was.

But at the same time, the Prince felt  _bored,_ like a part of him was missing something. And he didn't have to be a genius to pinpoint what that something was.  _Belle._ In the past few days, he'd been thinking about her far more than he wanted to. Whenever he walked through the castle, his eyes would look to all the places he used to find her, only to feel a sad longing in the pit of his stomach when he realized she wasn't there anymore. When he'd close his eyes at night, he'd see her smiling at him from across the dinner table, a book in one hand and a spoonful of tomato soup in the other. It was as though he were mourning a loss, but a loss he had no physical evidence of, a loss only he remembered.

 _There's no use moping over something you can't change,_  he kept telling himself. So in an attempt to put his old love behind him, the Prince tried to focus on his courtship and upcoming marriage to Princess Amandine. But even this turned out to be a chore more than anything. While Adam was confident that Amandine didn't have a single bad bone in her body, she still lacked the fire and critical mind that had drawn him to Belle all those weeks ago. Just a day after her arrival, Adam took Amandine to the library to read aloud from Shakespeare's  _Measure for Measure_. Amandine understood the plot easily enough, but when Adam tried sharing his insights into the Duke's ulterior motives and the play's political undertones, she grew confused and overwhelmed, preferring to agree with him instead of challenging his thoughts as Belle would. The whole experience left Adam greatly unsatisfied. He hadn't realized how much he'd  _enjoyed_ having literary debates with Belle in the time they'd spent living together. Next to that, quiet evenings with a wife who was too polite to speak her mind did not feel like much of a trade-off.

On more than one occasion, Adam had entertained the idea of using the Enchantress's book to travel to Belle's village, just to catch a quick glimpse of her. He hadn't realized how lonely and disconnecting it could be to live in a new world, and perhaps the sight of her familiar face was what he needed to find closure on the whole ordeal. It wouldn't be too difficult either. With the right timing, he could travel to Villeneuve, see Belle, and return without anyone noticing his absence. But almost immediately after considering this idea, he chided himself for being so capricious. He'd never been a master of self-control, and couldn't trust himself not to let one visit escalate into several, making him just as bad as Lancelot or Macbeth in his inability to resist temptation. If there was one thing his old curse had taught him, it was to avoid making impulsive decisions that would cause negative consequences for him down the road.

But while Adam had sworn off using the book to see Belle, he could still use its magic for other purposes. Each night he would read a little more of the mysterious story hidden in its pages. Its fragmented fairy tale-like prose couldn't tell him everything that had happened in the last five years, but it was enough to update him on the essentials. Through it, Adam learned that he'd spent the last few years touring Europe with his mother-imposter; his old spending habits and womanizing tendencies were a thing of the past. His decision to marry a princess from another kingdom was his way of renouncing that old life for good. It was a decision his former self may have wanted, but Adam still wasn't sure if it was what  _he_ wanted.

Four days after arriving in the new timeline, Adam was gazing idly out the West Wing window, wondering if he could see Belle's village if he ordered someone to cut down all the trees, when Cogsworth entered the room.

"Master?" he said. "The Queen would like me to remind you that dinner will begin in fifteen minutes time. Please don't be late."

"I won't," the Prince promised. He continued to look out the window as the majordomo shuffled around the room to collect his laundry.

"If I may speak openly, Master," he continued as he completed this task, "I couldn't help but notice how you've seemed more… reclusive as of late. Is everything all right?"

"Yes, Cogsworth. I just… I have a lot on my mind."

"Courting a fiancée is no small feat," the majordomo agreed in sympathy. "Still, I must say that the two of you make a highly agreeable couple. Princess Amandine is a lovely young lady."

"Indeed. She's everything a prince could want in a princess. I just…" He hesitated. "I just don't think that I  _love_  her."

There, he'd finally said it. And saying it was like revealing an ugly sin to the world. But it was the truth. As much as he'd tried to keep an open mind about Amandine, deep down he knew that he was only fooling himself. He could never feel for her what he'd once felt for Belle. He looked back at the majordomo in guilt. "Is that…normal?"

Cogsworth looked surprised, but not repulsed. "I think the real question, Master, is: do you need to marry for love?" he replied. "From my experience, love is a childish notion that can lead to ridiculous flights of folly. Not to mention thoughts and feelings most unwelcome, unsavoury, and… well, nauseating." He wrinkled his face distastefully. "Yes, it's far better to marry someone you respect, even  _tolerate_ , than somebody you 'love.' Such feelings will only distract you from your priorities. Which must come before all else, including loved ones, as cruel as that may sound. Such is the duty of a prince."

"I suppose you're right," Adam agreed reluctantly. He wondered if he ought to bring up the fact that his parents had entered a loveless marriage which had ended in disaster. But surely that wasn't true of all marriages? If the only success criteria for a civil union was that the husband and wife respected each other, then he supposed that he and Amandine were perfectly matched. "What about your wife?" he continued. "Did you marry her because you... 'tolerated' her?"

Cogsworth's face turned beet red. "Well now, that's a different story. You see, when I met Clothilde, I was, well, I was… I think I'd better check on Cuisiner to see how the dinner's coming along, yes?"

He scurried out of the room, forgetting to pick up one of Adam's shirts in the process. Adam sighed as he watched him leave. He knew that Cogsworth wasn't the best person to seek marital advice from, but there was  _some_  truth to what he was saying. Had the Enchantress never cursed him, Adam probably wouldn't have given a second thought to whether he loved Amandine or not. But after emotionally investing himself in Belle for so long, he now had feelings for her that he couldn't wish away. The question was: how long could these feelings last before they became more than an out-of-hand infatuation? And what should he do if they  _did_ last that long?

* * *

Dinner with Henriette, Amandine and François was a quiet affair. Adam had run out of things to say to the Princess, and Amandine hadn't been saying much to him either, apart from the occasional greeting and rigid small talk.

"Adam," Henriette said after the servants had cleared their appetizer plates, "François and I have been thinking. Perhaps, considering the warmer weather, you'd like to give Princess Amandine a tour of the local villages?"

Adam let out a sputtering noise, nearly choking on the wine he'd just swallowed. "Erm, but some of them are quite far from here aren't they?" he replied once he could speak again. "It might tire out the horses to make them travel so far."

"Don't be ridiculous, dear," Henriette said dismissively. "We used to tour the towns all the time when you were a boy, and none of our horses ever suffered for it! Besides, when's the last time you've travelled outside the castle? The fresh air will do you some good."

Adam turned to his fiancée reluctantly. "Amandine? Would you like to see the rest of the kingdom?"

"If His Highness wishes it, then I would be happy to go," the Princess replied.

"Of course he does!" said Henriette. And with her word, the trip was set.

* * *

Adam and Amandine set off on their tour of the kingdom first thing in the morning. Accompanied by Adam's driver, Ambroise, the two of them boarded the royal carriage and rode off into the woods. Less than an hour later, the small hilltop community of Villeneuve appeared on the horizon.

"That's Villeneuve, the closest village to our castle," Adam explained, eager to distract himself from the queasy feeling that had been building in his stomach since he'd woken up that morning. "It's a farming community and our main provider of food. Most of our servants' family members live in this village. Some of them also choose to retire here after they've grown too old to work at the castle."

"It sounds like a lovely place to live," Amandine replied admiringly.

The carriage turned into Villeneuve's main street and the Princess peered out the window, hazel eyes widening as she took in the town's distinctive sights and sounds. "Oh, what adorable little houses! Is that a goat? And... a pig?" She let out an uncharacteristically girlish laugh. "And is that…" She gasped. "The marketplace?" She looked back at the Prince, face glowing in excitement. "Adam, would you mind if we took a look around here for a little while? I've always been curious to know what the markets look like in these little towns. Sometimes you find the most interesting wares."

"Believe me, there's not much to see," Adam replied, trying to sound indifferent. "All the villages here sell the same things. Houseware items, livestock, clothing, produce..."

"But surely they wouldn't sell the  _exact_  same produce as they do in Claircomble?" she countered. "Just a small peek? I promise not to delay the rest of our trip."

Adam sighed. Truthfully, he didn't want to stop in this village because he was afraid of the possibility of running into Belle. But then he remembered the lecture his mother had given him the previous night about putting on "a good face" for his guests and relented. It wasn't right to refuse Amandine a tour of Villeneuve on account of his own irrational fears.

"Ambroise," he said, sticking his head out the carriage window, "stop here, please."

* * *

Villeneuve's marketplace was like a painting in motion. Citizens in brightly-coloured clothes walked among the stalls, chattering loudly to each other as merchants called out to them to look at their goods. But at the sight of the Prince and Princess, the citizens ceased their noise, stared at them in wonderment and bowed before clearing a path for them. Amandine nodded and smiled politely at everyone as she passed them. Adam, feeling uncomfortable, forced himself to do the same.

He followed Amandine to each of the stalls, keeping one eye on the crowd and one on his fiancée as she made small talk with the merchants. Despite his reservations about marrying her, Adam found himself impressed with Amandine's ability to put a smile on the people's faces through her charisma and kind words. She clearly had a genuine interest in connecting with her subjects; something Adam couldn't say about the women he used to mingle with in the days before his curse.

Twenty minutes later, the Prince and Princess returned to the carriage with bouquets of flowers and other free samples the merchants had given them during their visit. There'd been no sign of Belle in the marketplace, much to Adam's relief.  _Maybe she doesn't live in this town anymore and I got myself worked up for nothing!_

But as he waited for Amandine to board the carriage so they could continue their tour, he heard a man shouting from the church behind them. His voice was booming and boisterous, making his words impossible to miss.

"Belle, I've done my best to play nice with you, but enough is enough! When are you going to wake up and realize that your father's music boxes will never provide enough income to live properly? I know how much you dote on him, and your daughterly devotion is certainly commendable, but face the facts: how many years does he have left in him? Once he's gone, you'll have  _nothing._  Stop living in this senseless existence and accept that I'm the only future you have left!"

"I'm sorry, Gaston, but for the hundredth time, my answer is  _no."_

 _That voice._ Just hearing it sent shivers down the Prince's spine. He hated himself for turning around, knowing who he would see before he'd even laid eyes on her. There, standing in front of the church, basket on her shoulder, hands on her hips and a tight-lipped scowl on her face, was Belle. She was dressed in a simple blue working dress, similar to the one she'd worn in her early days at the castle. The object of her scowling was a man in a brown and red jacket, his jet-black hair slicked back into a small pompadour. Another few feet away from them was a portly man in a blue coat, who was watching the confrontation with an uneasy expression on his face.

"You're only saying that because you're in denial of your feelings for me," the man with the booming voice continued. "Believe me, I understand. But I'm here to tell you that you don't have to hide your feelings any longer. Just drop the stubborn act and you'll see that you and I truly belong together."

"Feelings?" Belle laughed. "Gaston, you're a very accomplished hunter, and I'm sure you were brilliant in the war, but I just don't  _love you._ And I'm quite sure you don't love me, either. You're just in love with the idea of me becoming your devoted wife."

"Oh, come on, Belle," Gaston retorted, pursing his lips together in a pout. "You know that's not true! I want to marry you because I  _care_  about you and think we'd be very happy together."

"Well we'll have to agree to disagree then, won't we?" Belle countered. "Because I've pictured our future together and it doesn't interest me at all." She tried to step away, but Gaston grabbed her arm, pulling her closer.

"Belle, you know there's nothing I couldn't give you," he said, his voice now low and serious. "I'd never settle for anything less for my  _perfect_  wife. All I'm asking is for one little word in return."

He leaned closer to her until their faces were inches apart. At the same time, Adam felt his face flush as an uncontrollable rage took hold of him – something he hadn't felt in a long time.

"Adam?" Amandine called out to him in surprise. "Where are you going?"

"Give me a minute," he replied.

He stormed over to the couple. Belle was visibly uncomfortable and trying to back away from Gaston, but despite her efforts, the gap was closing fast.

"What is the  _meaning_  of this?!" the Prince shouted.

At Adam's unannounced appearance, Belle and Gaston's eyes widened in shock. "Your Highness!" they both exclaimed, separating from each other faster than two flies about to be crushed with a boot.

"I don't need anyone causing trouble in my kingdom," Adam continued firmly. "Would you care to explain what the commotion is about?"

"Prince Adam – what an honour it is to have you in our village," Gaston said smoothly, pouring on the charm. "I'm sure you know who I am: the army captain who so bravely defended your father's lands in the war and won so many battles. Why, if it weren't for me, even your own castle might have been taken by the invaders!" He paused a moment, clearly expecting thanks. When Adam remained silent, he looked a bit miffed, but went on. "This young woman has taken my fancy, and I have done her the great honour of requesting her hand in marriage. Her prospects are poor: her father's sole income is making music boxes, and she has no dowry. She is also considered rather odd in this village – there are no other suitors on the horizon. I don't know if you're aware, but unmarried women in this town face a bleak future of poverty and begging in the streets. I am trying to  _save_  her from that dire fate!" He smiled and leaned closer to Adam, as if talking one man to another. "As a royal,  _you_  understand more than anyone the vital importance of making the right match, one which will bring practical benefits to both parties. Perhaps you can help her see reason?"

Belle looked at the Prince nervously as Adam looked back at her in pity. "I'm afraid that a woman's mind is her own, monsieur," he replied coolly. "If she refuses a marriage proposal, then there's little I can do to sway her opinion."

"Exactly!" Gaston nodded in agreement. "You hear that, Belle? Even the Prince thinks that—Hey, wait a minute!"

"But I may be able to arrest you for harassment, seeing as you tried to kiss the poor girl without her consent," Adam continued.

Hearing this threat, Gaston's face turned white as a sheet. "Oh no no no. Please forgive me, Your Highness," he apologized, lifting his hands up defensively. "I only meant to..."

"Oh,  _believe me,_ monsieur. I saw enough from my carriage to know what your  _intentions_ were. Now go about your business and leave the young lady alone."

As stubborn as he was, Gaston knew better than to pick a fight with a prince. He slouched his shoulders and scowled in defeat. "Come on LeFou," he said to the stout man standing loyally nearby, "we're leaving."

It wasn't until Adam had watched the two men disappear behind the church that he focused his attention back on Belle.

"Thank you, Your Highness," she said to him graciously. "That was very kind of you."

"That man had no right to treat you that way. Who is he?"

"Gaston Légume. He's a war hero with an oversized ego. He thinks he's entitled to anything. Or  _anyone,"_  she added under her breath.

"I'm very sorry. Are you all right?"

She fixed her dark eyes on him curiously, as though she'd never been asked this question before. Then she replied in a guarded tone, "Fine for now, thanks." He noticed that she was holding a book, and tilted his head to read the title:  _Romeo and Juliet._  Belle's favourite Shakespeare play.

The Prince felt a rush of hope, seeing an opening. He missed their Shakespeare discussions so much! Gesturing at the book, he smiled and said, "Wonderful book you have there!"

But instead of looking pleased, Belle's eyes narrowed skeptically. "That's exactly what Gaston said—except it turned out he'd never read it, or any other book, for that matter."

"Oh," Adam replied, thrown off-guard. "Well, _I've_  read it."

"That's good to hear. I'm glad there are still  _some_  men in the world who appreciate literature." Belle curtseyed. "Well, thank you again for your assistance, Your Highness. I should be heading home now."

"Erm... May I walk you back to your residence? In case Monsieur Légume and his companion... follow you?" he proposed nervously.

She tilted her head at him in suspicion. "Surely you have better things to do than escort a simple farm girl like me back to her house?"

"It's no trouble," he lied. "My driver is stopping to water the horses anyway."

"Well... if you insist." She bit her lip. "My name is Belle, by the way. Belle Gagnier."

"Prince Adam de Bauffremont. But um...I'm sure you knew that already."

Belle smiled sheepishly and headed for the direction of her home. Before Adam followed her, he turned around to see Amandine staring at him from the carriage.  _You idiot!_ he thought. In his haste to speak to Belle, he'd almost forgotten about the tour.

 _I'll be right back_ , he mouthed to her.

Amandine looked confused, but graciously retreated back into the carriage to wait for him.

* * *

It wasn't long before Adam regretted his decision to escort Belle back to her house. Not only because he felt guilty about leaving Amandine behind, but because being alone with Belle was causing unwanted feelings to resurface. He couldn't ignore the uncomfortable pounding in his chest or the sweaty sensation in his palms as he followed her down a cobbled side street and past several shops leading to the outskirts of the village.

"So, um... Mademoiselle Gagnier," he said, trying break the awkward silence between them. "What do you do in this village? Aside from read books, I mean."

"Well…" She paused. "I suppose you could consider me something of a homemaker. I invent things. Simple machines mostly, to help me complete my chores. It's not much, but it does make the housework quicker."

Adam smiled. At least that part of Belle's history hadn't changed in this universe. "That sounds like a productive way to pass the time. And you live with your father?"

Belle perked up at the mention of her beloved father. "Yes, his name is Maurice Gagnier," she replied. "He's an artisan, and his specialty is in crafting music boxes. He's hoping to make a business out of it soon."

"I see. And how's that been working out for him?"

Her expression fell. "Truthfully, Your Highness, it's been a slow start," she confessed. "My father went to La Fontaine a few weeks ago to sell one of his best boxes to a merchant there, but it was damaged shortly after he arrived in the city. It took him days to return home, and another several weeks before he received all the parts he needed to repair the box. He's hoping to reassemble it by the end of the week so he can return to La Fontaine."

"Hmm. Well I wish him well in his second attempt," Adam replied. "May I ask what he's planning to do with the money he makes from this music box of his?"

"We're hoping to use the profit to move to a new town," Belle explained. "Perhaps someplace bigger, like Racine or Molière."

"Why? You don't like it here in Villeneuve?"

"No. I mean uh, yes!" she stammered. "Forgive me, Your Highness. I would never speak ill of one of your villages. It's just that my father and I have spent most of our lives living in small towns, making ends meet. But I believe that my father's new music box will be the start of a new life for us. A chance for us to run a business in a town where people can buy my father's crafts at a reasonable price. And perhaps for myself… maybe…"

"You'll find someone there who likes to read as much as you do?"

She looked at him with an incredulous expression on her face. "Yes, actually. How did you know?"

"A lucky guess," he fibbed. "If I were in your position, living among braggarts who care more about marital life than fine literature, then I too would want to move somewhere where people understand and appreciate me. But I'm sure won't have to look far." He smiled at her encouragingly. "People will admire you wherever you go, Mademoiselle Gagnier. Admire your interest in books and inventing machines, that is."

Belle returned his smile, albeit hesitantly. "Thank you, Your Highness. I appreciate that."

They approached a narrow brick and mortar house at the edge of the village; its ashen colour offset by a small green garden at the front of the property. Adam's eyes widened at the sight. He'd had an idea of the type of house Belle lived in based on her background and social standing, but he hadn't expected to see  _this:_ a dreary-looking shack, no larger than the stables back at the castle.

"It's so small," he said in disbelief.

"Well, from a certain point of view, I suppose that it would be," Belle replied. There was a tinge of bitterness in her voice, and Adam was unsure if she was jesting with him or patronizing him.

"You're right," he apologized. "Please forgive my uncouthness." He cleared his throat. "I'm glad to have met you, Belle Gagnier."

"You too, Your Highness." She smiled at him again. "Enjoy the rest of your day."

"You as well." He bowed politely and watched as she climbed the stairs up to her house, a grin plastered on his face that lasted just a bit too long.

* * *

"Who was that girl you were speaking to?" asked Amandine. She was sitting across from Adam in the carriage, Villeneuve rapidly shrinking into the distance as their driver chauffeured them to their next destination.

"Oh, just some artisan's daughter," Adam replied, trying to sound as nonchalant as possible. "She got into a skirmish with a man by the church who was trying to force her hand. She seemed shaken from the ordeal, so I thought it only right to walk her back to her house."

"The poor dear." Amandine clasped a hand to her chest in sympathy. "I'm sure she appreciated your chivalry."

"Yes. I believe she did." He forced himself to look back at the Princess. "What about you? Did you enjoy your tour of Villeneuve?"

"Oh yes!" Amandine replied, smiling brightly. "It's full of vibrant and interesting people. I'm very much looking forward to becoming their queen one day."

Adam's expression fell. "I'm… glad to hear that."

 _You fool!_ he chided to himself.  _You should be spending your time with Amandine, not with some peasant girl who doesn't even remember you! Didn't you swear you would leave her alone once you changed time?_

He knew he should be ashamed of himself for breaking his own rule, but he wasn't. All he could think about were those exhilarating five minutes he'd spent alone with Belle in the village, seeing her face, hearing her voice again, feeling things for her that he shouldn't be feeling at all. These emotions, marred by the uncomfortable awareness of his current responsibilities, left him conflicted, and so he was silent for the rest of the trip.

* * *

That evening, after Adam and Amandine had returned to the castle, Henriette called them into her bureau for an emergency meeting about their upcoming wedding ceremony.

"I'm afraid I have some bad news," she began somberly, a roll of parchment in hand. "I've just received a letter from the Vicomte and Vicomtesse de La Tour du Pin, announcing that they're unable to attend the engagement ball next week. It seems that the date of the ball conflicts with the Comte de Beaulaincourt's christening ceremony, which is occurring on the same day."

"The Vicomte and Vicomtesse de La Tour du Pin are a load of busybodies anyway," François said indifferently. "We'd be far better off without their company. Besides, that's just one invitation. Surely we have enough guests to continue with the festivities?"

"I wish it were so," Henriette replied. "From reviewing the RSVP list from Cogsworth, it looks like most of our invitees have also deferred their invitations in favour of attending the Comte's ceremony. Out of the one hundred invitations we sent out, only a fifth of them have written back to say they will be coming next week."

"What?" The King looked flabbergasted.

"It is disappointing, but I can understand their logic," Henriette went on. "Many of the nobility in this part of France find it more convenient to travel to estates that have paved roads and are easily accessible by carriage. Our castle, situated deep in the woods, provides neither of those luxuries."

"But surely there must be  _something_ we can do to amend the numbers," François insisted. "My daughter's wedding cannot proceed without a proper celebration!"

"I concur, François, but I'm afraid that our options are limited," said the Queen. "Given the lack of invitees, we may well have to cancel our children's ball or reschedule it for another date."

Amandine tensed, clearly unhappy at the prospect and Adam frowned. As a prince, he was well-aware that a wedding between two members of the French monarch would be very anticlimactic if there wasn't a proper audience to receive them. And rescheduling the wedding would only complicate matters, as François was leaving the castle after the ceremony to attend to affairs in his own kingdom. Meaning that next week was the only available time they had to host the engagement ball.

Then, an idea struck him. "What if we invited the townspeople from Villeneuve?"

Henriette looked at her son in surprise. "You would invite the common people to an aristocratic function?"

"Yes." Adam cleared his throat. "But hear me out, Mère. You've always said that the worth of a ruler is not in how he treats his equals, but by how he treats his subjects. What better way to practice that principle than by inviting the villagers to celebrate with us? They live close enough to the castle, so transportation won't be an issue." He turned to his fiancée. "Amandine, you liked speaking with the citizens in the marketplace, didn't you?"

"I enjoyed making their acquaintance, yes," Amandine admitted. "And they do seem to be a pleasant group of people."

"I think it's a marvellous idea!" Henriette agreed. "Inviting the villagers will be a great way to strengthen our rapport with them and introduce you as the future King and Queen. François, what do you think?"

"It's certainly unconventional," the King replied. "But as long as the celebrations will continue as planned, then I have no objection to inviting the villagers to the wedding."

"Excellent. It's settled then." Henriette smiled and clapped her hands. "I'll have Écrivain write a new set of invitations to send out to the village. With any luck, we'll have them ready by the end of this week. Thank you for your quick thinking, Adam."

The Prince couldn't believe his own luck. He was going to see Belle again, less than a week after running into her in Villeneuve!  _If she comes at all_ , said a nagging voice in the back of his head. She'd expressed her insecurities about mingling with her fellow townsfolk in the past. What if she was afraid that she wouldn't enjoy herself if she attended a ball with them? What if she was afraid she'd be ridiculed for showing up? What if she chose to decline her invitation because of that?

He had just the idea to win her over.

It took him no time to find the first volume of Shakespeare's works in the library, tucked between a translated copy of Christopher Marlowe's  _The Massacre at Paris_ and Thomas Kyd's  _The Spanish Tragedy_. Just seeing the old leather-bound tome was enough to fill him with a strong feeling of nostalgia. He'd lost track of the number of times he'd seen Belle pore over its pages in the old universe, amazed that one playwright could create stories with such intricate characters and captivating prose. If this book wouldn't make Belle jump with joy, then Adam didn't know what would.

He hurried to his writing desk, grabbed a quill and scribbled on the first page underneath the title:

 _To the girl who reads_ Romeo and Juliet, _please accept this humble gift._

-  _Prince Adam de Bauffremont_

Then, he closed the book and went to find Écrivain to ask him to include it with the Gagniers' wedding invitation.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> No, I haven't abandoned this story, just become extremely busy with real life.
> 
> A shout out to CarolNJoy and TrudiRose for their beta-editing on this chapter. Cogsworth and 2017 Gaston and Belle would definitely sound less in-character without their help!


	4. Chapter 4

"I, Prince Thomas-Alexandre Adam de Bauffremont take thee, Princess Marie-Amandine Victoire de Lanzac to be my wedded wife, to have and to hold from this day forward, for better, for worse: for richer, for poorer; in sickness and in health; to… to…"

 _"Love."_  Père Robert prompted.

"Love." Adam cleared his throat. "Thank you. To love and to cherish, till death us do part, according to God's holy law; and thereto I give thee my troth."

Amandine smiled. With her hand held in her fiancé's overly sweaty palm, she replied, "I, Princess Marie-Amandine Victoire de Lanzac take thee, Prince Thomas-Alexandre Adam de Bauffremont to be my wedded husband, to have and to hold from this day forward, for better, for worse: for richer, for poorer; in sickness and in health; to love and to cherish, till death us do part, according to God's holy law; and thereto I give thee my troth."

"Bravo!" Henriette exclaimed, clapping loudly as she stood up from the front pew.  _"Much_  better."

François, who sat beside the Queen, soon imitated her applause. Taking advantage of their interruption, Adam released Amandine's hand and wiped the sweat from his hands. For the past three hours, he and his fiancée had been rehearsing their vows with Villeneuve's chaplain in the castle chapel while the King and Queen watched on attentively. It was a tedious procedure and truthfully, Adam would rather be doing anything else. All this ceremony was giving him a small headache, and seemed to serve as a painful reminder of his impending marriage, which was now less than a day away.

Thankfully, the Prince was saved from yet another mind-numbing run down of the vow exchanges as the chapel doors opened to reveal Cadenza and his wife, Madame de la Garderobe.

 _"Buongiorno,_ Your Majesties!" the Maestro said, approaching the King and Queen with a courteous bow.

"Bonjour Maestro Cadenza. Madame de la Garderobe," Henriette replied. "To what do we owe the pleasure?"

"With your permission,  _Padrona,_  we would like to use the organ to practice the processional music for tomorrow's ceremony," the Maestro explained. "But only if it is convenient for you, of course. If you still need the chapel for rehearsal, then we can always come back at another time."

"I believe I speak for everyone when I say that we've been rehearsing long enough," said François. "Besides, it's almost noon and I'm famished! I wouldn't object to having some of that delicious  _bouillabaisse_  for luncheon right about now."

"That can be arranged. Consider the chapel yours, Maestro," the Queen declared. She turned to the chaplain. "Père Robert, thank you for taking the time to rehearse with us today. Shall we see you back here tomorrow for the ceremony?"

"Of course, Your Majesty," Père Robert replied with a bow. "I would never miss out on the opportunity to preach at the royal family's wedding."

" _Grazie, Padrona,"_ Cadenza echoed as the chaplain closed up his books and exited the chapel. "And believe me when I say that you will be highly impressed by the restorative work Maestro Forte has done to the organ. Its new set of golden pipes sound absolutely  _magnifico!_ Your son should try it out himself some time."

"Thank you for the invitation, Maestro," Adam replied, embarrassed. "But I will leave all the serenading to you and your wife."

"You play?" Amandine inquired, turning to her fiancé with interest.

"A little." He shrugged. "I took harpsichord lessons as a child, but I quit years ago."

"A pity too," said Henriette, putting an arm around him affectionately. "He had the makings of a fine prodigy. He may have even rivalled the likes of Mozart himself, had he applied himself."

"You exaggerate, Mère. I was… an adequate player at best." He grew silent as an unpleasant memory came to the forefront of his mind. But before he could fully dwell on it, François changed the subject, and the vision slipped away as quickly as it had come.

* * *

As Adam accompanied Henriette, Amandine and François to the dining room, he began to mull over the complexity of his current circumstances. He was getting married tomorrow, but all he could think about was the possibility of seeing Belle at his engagement ball. He'd lost count of the number of times he'd caught himself fantasizing over their hypothetical meeting in the past week; wondering if she would fall in love with him the same way Cinderella had with her Prince or Juliet with her Romeo. These imaginings came from the idealistic side of him—the side that Belle had inadvertently rekindled when he'd imprisoned her. The realistic part of him knew it was foolish and useless to indulge in things that would never be. Or else there would be hell to pay.

"My word!" Henriette said, startling Adam from his thoughts. She had stopped to stare at a painting on the wall; the family portrait that used to hang in the West Wing to be precise. "Well here's a portrait I've not seen in a while! Adam, do you remember how old you were when we commissioned this? Ten, eleven years old?"

"I suppose," Adam replied dully. He'd noticed the family portrait was missing from the West Wing and had been happy not to be reminded of it until now.

"Oh, what a sweet-looking boy!" Amandine remarked as she took a closer look at the painting. "Much better than the portraits they used to make of me back home. They were beautiful of course, but they never looked quite like  _me."_

"And I presume that the dark-haired man on the left was Adam's father?" François asked curiously.

"Yes," Henriette confirmed. "His name was Louis-Thomas Antoine de Bauffremont. He died of a fever when Adam was only eighteen. Unfortunately, I was in Guadeloupe at the time, so I couldn't pay my respects until I returned home."

Adam hesitantly approached the canvas, hands clenching into his fists as he studied his father's image. It was amazing how a simple portrait could show more soul in that man's eyes than he'd ever shown in life. If he still had claws, Adam knew that he'd gladly slash his father's face apart all over again.

* * *

The hour of the engagement ball arrived all but too soon. Adam's stomach twisted into knots as he studied his reflection in the West Wing mirror. He'd requested to wear something blue for the ball, and his tailors had certainly delivered. Adam was wearing a powder blue jacket with delicate stencils of leaves and silver-threaded fastenings on the lapels. A matching waistcoat and silk breeches completed the ensemble. For cosmetics, he'd chosen not to wear a wig, instead letting Chapeau tie his hair into a simple ponytail and add a few curls to the top of his head. His face remained clear and shaven. The only powder he wore was to hide the minor blemishes on his skin. He certainly looked impressive enough to host an engagement ball, but would it be enough to impress  _her?_

"Are you feeling quite well, Master?" Chapeau asked as the Prince continued to examine himself in the mirror. "I haven't seen you this flustered for quite some time."

"It's my first time inviting commoners to a royal function, Chapeau," Adam explained. "Under the circumstances I… well I suppose I'd like to know that I'm making a good impression."

"I'm sure they will be  _more_  than impressed by you," the valet said reassuringly, stepping forward to adjust his bowtie. "You are their Prince, after all."

"A Prince who would be nothing without his servants," he countered. "I don't know if I've said it before, Chapeau, but I truly and sincerely thank you for everything you've done for me."

"Master?" Cogsworth called from the doorway. "It's time!"

"That's your cue." Chapeau let go of Adam's bowtie and smiled.  _"Bon courage, Maître!_ Have fun tonight."

Taking a deep breath, Adam inspected his reflection one last time before he exited the room, ready to greet the masses.

* * *

 _"Mesdames et Messieurs,"_ the majordomo announced to the waiting crowd. "May I present His Royal Highness, Prince Thomas-Alexandre Adam de Bauffremont and his fiancée, Her Royal Highness, Princess Marie-Amandine Victoire de Lanzac!"

With a smile plastered on his face, Adam took Amandine's hand and stepped into the ballroom. Many guests had arrived. Men and women of all ages, dressed in a plethora of colours and designs filled the room. Years ago, Adam would have cringed at the lack of proper colour coordination among his invitees, but he had more pressing things to focus on now. He carefully examined his subjects as they bowed and curtsied, searching for the one guest he was most anxious to find. He saw Gaston dressed in a crimson jacket with brass buttons, and beside him, his portly companion dressed in a dark blue waistcoat and burgundy bowtie, but no Belle _._ The Prince's smile faded.  _Maybe she didn't like the book I sent her and chose to defer my invitation after all._

But remembering his commitment to keeping up appearances, Adam bottled his disappointment, acknowledged his guests with a nod, and turned to his fiancée. If anyone was to be the "belle of the ball" tonight, it was her. Amandine was dressed in a floral, cream-coloured mantua dress with long, lacey back cuffs. She wore a string of pearls around her neck, and her hair was pinned up into an elegant, but not over-the-top updo. She looked radiant, dignified and regal in her appearance, but at the same time  _predictable._ As much as Adam wanted to appreciate her beauty, a part of him couldn't stop thinking about how her outfit paled in comparison to the yellow gown Belle had worn during their first dance together. It may have been simple and unconventional by court standards, but so uniquely  _Belle_ in its eccentricity. He would give anything for the chance to see her in that dress again.

From the corner of the ballroom, Maestro Cadenza cued the music for the night: a series of string quartet pieces by an Austrian composer named Haydn, which Amandine had selected herself.

"May I have this dance, Princess?" Adam asked of his bride-to-be.

"You may," Amandine replied politely.

Hand-in-hand, the Prince and Princess danced across the floor to prescribed steps they'd rehearsed the day before. Amandine moved like a cloud in her elegant dress, showing off her noble upbringing as though it had been tailored to her feet. With such poise and grace, Adam was starting to wonder if there was anything she could do wrong.

"Can you believe it?" she asked him as their guests partnered up to join in on the dancing. "Only one day left."

"One day left until what?"

Her eyes widened, as though he'd thrown her an unintentional insult. "Why, until we're married of course!"

"Oh." The Prince's face grew warm. "Of course. Forgive me. I was merely… thinking."

"About what?"

"Is there anything you've ever wanted to do? More than anything else in the world?"

"Well…" Amandine bit her lip pensively. "I suppose that I wouldn't say no to travelling to Hamburg to hear what a real German opera sounds like. And to wear my hair down and try riding astride every once in a while. Why do you ask?"

"Oh, I don't know." He shook his head. "Curiosity, I suppose. For a princess as talented and intelligent as yourself, you've come so far from home to marry me. It's quite a sacrifice, isn't it? Leaving your family and kingdom behind. Don't you think you'll… miss them?"

"It will be sad to no longer see my family in Claircomble," Amandine agreed. "But all princesses need to make sacrifices for their kingdom. We wouldn't be fulfilling our duty otherwise. True, it may not exactly be the 'happily ever after' we read about in fairy stories, but we can take comfort in knowing we have the power to make a difference in our people's lives through our words and actions. What about you, Adam?" She fixed her eyes on him curiously. "Do I make you… happy?"

Adam opened his mouth, searching for words that wouldn't come. A part of him wanted to be honest with Amandine. To tell her that while he deeply admired and respected her, he couldn't be completely happy with her while his heart belonged to somebody else. It wasn't her fault—he'd simply shown up at the wrong place at the wrong time. But despite all the reasons why Belle stood out to him as his better match, Amandine still remained at heart, a perfectly good and decent person. And it was that good-natured aspect of her that made Adam afraid of hurting her feelings. It was a strange concept, he thought, to  _worry_ about upsetting someone when he couldn't have cared less about it before.

Thankfully, the Prince was saved from initiating that uncomfortable conversation as a newcomer entered the ballroom. Whoever she was, she was quite pretty, wearing a peacock blue dress with billowing skirts and a cream-coloured petticoat. He turned around to get a closer look at her face, and all the air left his chest. It was Belle.

Belle wasn't the best dressed of his guests, but neither was she the worst. Aside from her petticoat, the only distinguishable features of her outfit were the lace on her sleeves and a silver locket which hung a few inches above her square neckline. Her caramel-brown hair was pinned sensibly behind her head and she wore no lipstick or rouge on her face. Her outfit would be acceptable for a commoner's Sunday best, Adam supposed, but its plain and cheap material would barely pass as casual wear for a woman of nobility. But none of that mattered. Belle was still beautiful, and always would be, no matter what she wore. As though in a trance, he moved closer to her, stopping only when he realized that he was accidentally dragging Amandine along with him.

"Excuse me," he said absently, breaking off his dance with her.

Belle looked into the ballroom in awe and amazement, as though she'd never seen anything so incredible in her entire life. Her expression reminded Adam of when he'd shown her the library over a lifetime ago. He'd considered it a token gift then, a small act of charity for a girl whose only knowledge of literature had been through those saccharine romances she borrowed from Père Robert. He certainly hadn't appreciated the delight on her face then the way he did now. Stopping in front of her, Adam cleared his throat and said, "Good evening, Mademoiselle Gagnier."

Belle turned around with a start. Her expression brightened at the sight of the Prince's familiar face. "Your Highness!" She curtsied. "Thank you for inviting me to your engagement ball. It's an honour to be here."

"The honour is all mine, Mademoiselle," Adam replied with a bow. "I'm glad you could make it."

"Well, at the very least I had to come and thank you for sending me that book," she explained. "It was yours, wasn't it?"

"Yes." Then he added, a little overzealously, "Did you like it? How much have you read?"

"Well, I've started the first act of  _A Midsummer Night's Dream,"_ she responded. "But I'm afraid I haven't had time to read the rest of it because I've been so busy packing. My father and I are moving to Diderot tomorrow, see."

Adam's expression fell. He felt as though the happy bubble growing inside him had suddenly received a puncture. "You're... leaving?"

"It is sudden, but yes," Belle confirmed excitedly. "See, my father managed to find a buyer for his music box in La Fontaine. And not only that, but he was able to get in touch with a proprietor there who owns some shops in Diderot. He's willing to lease one out to us, but we need to claim it before the end of the week or it will be sold to somebody else."

It took every bit of Adam's willpower to hold his tongue.  _You_ knew _this could happen,_ he told himself. A headstrong, independent woman like Belle had every right to choose where she wanted to live her life, even if that choice didn't involve him. Wasn't that why he'd changed time? To give her back the freedom he'd stolen from her when he was a beast? He should be happy for her, but instead, all he felt was a bitter disappointment. Still, he forced himself to smile. "Well, congratulations. That's...  _wonderful_ news," he said with fake enthusiasm. "I wish you and your father every success with your new music box venture."

Belle smiled. "Thank you, Your Highness."

Gesturing to the crowd, the Prince continued, "Would you care to dance?"

"Me? Dance?" Belle laughed nervously. "Well, I'm not too sure about that. I've never danced to this kind of music before. I'm afraid I... may not be very good."

"Nonsense. Something tells me that you're a  _wonderful_  dancer," Adam said dismissively. "It would give me great pleasure if you would join me."

He smiled again as he extended his hand to her. Belle hesitated, looked up at the Prince's trusting face, then reluctantly accepted his invitation.

Dancing with Belle as a human was similar, but at the same time, different from when Adam had danced with her as the Beast. He was closer in height to her now, and that size difference allowed him to see several aspects of her that he hadn't noticed before. There were faint creases on her forehead and freckles on her cheeks. He could even make out some golden strands in her hair—perhaps she'd been fair-haired once like his mother had been before her illness. He no longer felt like his monstrous body was overwhelming hers—in fact, he quite enjoyed the ease in which her fingers entwined around his and how he didn't have to worry about stepping on her toes with his oversized feet. He was smiling again, and considering everything he'd been through, he supposed that it was inevitable.

"So, Mademoiselle Gagnier," he said, eager to start any sort of conversation with the girl he'd been waiting to see for over a week. "What do you like the most about Shakespeare's works?"

"Hmm. Well, I suppose it would be his tragedies," she replied after a moment's thought. "In  _Romeo and Juliet_  for example, I find it so endearing how two people can fall for each other in impossible circumstances, giving up their families and their lives for the sake of love. I wouldn't condone their actions in real life of course, but something about their story feels so…" She paused. "Heart-rending and poignant. Not like Villeneuve." She looked away in disdain. "Nothing interesting ever happens there, and when someone  _does_  get married it's always out of convenience rather than love. But I'm sure this must all sound quite mundane to you, coming from a simple farm girl."

"Not at all." Adam shook his head. "There's nothing wrong with wanting to marry for love. What I find most ironic about  _Romeo and Juliet_ is that both of them could have lived if one little event had played out differently. If Romeo hadn't been so reckless for example, or if Juliet had fled to Mantua to see Romeo herself, or if Friar John had delivered the letter to Romeo in time, they may have found a way to make their parents accept their union, and the play would have ended very differently."

"Why, that's exactly what I think!" Belle replied, staring at the Prince in amazement. "What other books have you read aside from Shakespeare, Your Highness?"

"Several." He puffed up his chest proudly as he named them all.  _"The Odyssey, Don Quixote, Le Morte D'Arthur, The Divine Comedy, One Thousand and One Nights..._ but there's not a lot of romance in them I'm afraid. They're more… the action and adventure type. You know: sword fights, blood, guts, princes in disguise. I'm not sure if you'd care for them very much."

"Oh no, those all sound wonderful!" Belle replied with wide eyes. "I love reading adventure books just as much as I love reading romances. You'll need to make a list for me so I can see if any of the bookshops in Diderot sell them."

"I could…" Adam paused. "Or you could look for them  _here."_

Belle cocked her head in confusion.

"Belle—" he began nervously. "I mean,  _Mademoiselle._ I know we've only just met, but believe me when I say that we have a lot more in common than you realize. If you stayed here at my castle, I would treat you and your father as my honoured guests. My whole library would be at your disposal. You'd be well looked after and have whatever your heart desired. On my word as a prince."

He expected Belle to be surprised or touched by this out of the blue offer. Instead, she narrowed her eyes in suspicion. "And what exactly may I ask would you want in return for me staying here?"

"Well... nothing, of course," he replied, taken aback by the unexpected sharpness of her words. "Except for your company. And your promise that we make time to read together every once in a while."

Belle said nothing. She'd suddenly become very interested in studying at something at the far side of the ballroom. She raised her eyebrows and her face grew quite pale.

"Your Highness," she said loudly, turning back to him. "I am truly...  _flattered_ by your most generous offer. But I'm afraid that I can't accept it. I'm leaving Villeneuve tomorrow to start a new life with my father. And you're getting married to Princess Amandine. On my good faith, I cannot offer my services or 'company' to a man who will soon be lawfully married to somebody else."

It took a moment for Adam to realize what Belle was insinuating. Now it was his turn to look uncomfortable. "Mademoiselle, you misunderstand me. I only wanted to..."

"Oh, I think you've explained yourself quite well, Your Highness," Belle interrupted. Although she sounded angry, her face was flustered and agitated-looking. "And as much as I appreciate you taking an interest in my hobbies, I think it's best that we live our lives the way they were they were meant to be lived. Again, I thank you for inviting me to your ball tonight. I must be on my way home now. Goodbye."

Then, before Adam could utter so much as a syllable, Belle had flown from his grasp, rushing to the exit like Cinderella rushing to get back to her stepmother's house before midnight. And that wasn't the only thing he had to worry about.

When Adam turned around, he saw Amandine, Henriette and François standing at the far side of the ballroom; a mixture of shock and anger on their faces at the scandal they'd just witnessed.

* * *

"'He was a charming man,' she said. 'A  _charming_  man looking for a nice wife to settle down and produce an heir with.' I should have known that it was all a ruse to cover up his disgusting, sacrilegious, womanizing… habits!"

Fifteen minutes had passed since the end of Adam and Amandine's engagement party. Adam was sitting on the sofa, watching François pace the drawing room angrily with a glass of wine in hand. Amandine was standing by the window; seemingly unsure of whether she should be sitting down herself or not. Her face was downcast, but she wasn't crying—Adam didn't know whether to interpret that as a good or a bad sign.

"Adam?" Henriette said gently. She was standing across from the Prince, brows raised in deep concern. "Have you met this woman before?"

"Just once," he replied uncomfortably. "Back in Villeneuve, I—"

"Bah! Of course he's lying," François interrupted. "Don't listen to a word he says, Amandine. It's obvious that the peasant girl he danced with tonight was one of many of the many sleazy whores he's been hiding behind our backs this whole time!"

"She's NOT a whore!" Adam snapped, rising to his feet.

"Adam!" Henriette shouted, stepping between the two men with the speed of a young doe. "François! That's quite  _enough!_  I'd like a moment to speak to my son,  _alone_ please."

The King rolled his eyes, but compliantly waved his hand and turned around, leaving mother and son to talk in peace.

"Adam," Henriette began intently. "Have you been meeting with this woman in secret?"

"No," Adam replied.

"Have you been sending her letters or favours of any kind?"

"No."

"Have you engaged in any sexual relations with her?"

"Of course not!"

"Then what, may I ask, is your relationship with her?"

Adam took a deep breath. His gaze shifted from his mother, to François, to Amandine as he thought of an appropriate answer. Should he let the cat out of the bag and reveal the true nature of his relationship with Belle? Or lie and act like what they'd seen tonight was completely harmless?

He knew that the former option wouldn't sit well with any of them. With no one to defend his story about curses and time travelling, they'd all think he'd gone mental, or created an elaborate fabrication to justify why he  _couldn't_  marry Amandine. Either way, it would get him into a heap more trouble than he already was in. And he would gain absolutely nothing from it. He bowed his head in defeat.

"Nothing," he fibbed. "She was just an artisan's daughter I met in Villeneuve last week. She mentioned that she liked to read, so I sent her a book with her ball invitation to… encourage her passion. She came to the castle tonight to thank me and tell me that she and her father would be moving to Diderot tomorrow to start a new business. I asked her to dance with me to celebrate the good news. That's it."

The Queen raised an eyebrow in skepticism. "And I trust that whatever transpired between you and this... artisan's daughter won't interfere with the wedding ceremony tomorrow?"

"No." He shook his head. "Absolutely not. She's leaving and she's not coming back."

"Well then,"—She turned to address Amandine and François with a stilted smile—"I think there's nothing more to worry about here. It was all just a big mix-up. It won't happen again."

"It better not," François replied sharply. "As you know, I don't pick out husbands for my daughter lightly. If I hear or see another incident that involves your son cavorting with these wanton peasants, then consider us  _out_  of the arrangement."

Amandine met eyes with Adam, but said nothing. He almost wished that she was the one yelling at him instead of her father. Any word from her was better than silence.

* * *

Henriette escorted Adam to the West Wing for the night, despite his insistence that he was perfectly capable of walking there by himself. She said nothing to him the entire way, which made him feel both guilty and uncomfortable. He tried several times to voice an apology to her, but the words died in his throat every time.

It wasn't until they'd reached his bedroom that they finally exchanged words.

"Thierry. Defraine," the Queen said, addressing the guards standing by the West Wing doors. "Guard my son's room tonight and ensure that he doesn't leave."

"Yes, Your Majesty."

"Mère?"

Henriette turned to her son. Her face was tired and sorrowful now, a stark contrast to the composed demeanour she'd put on for their guests downstairs. "I'm very sorry about this, Adam," she said. "When your father sent me to Guadeloupe all those years ago, I had no idea of the cruel and selfish person he'd twist you up to become. I swore when I returned that I'd do everything in my power to break you of his bad habits. But it seems I didn't try hard enough. Just… stay in your room until the wedding ceremony tomorrow. It will put my mind at ease."

The Prince opened his mouth in outrage. "But I'm your son!" he insisted. "Why would I ever think of leaving you?"

"I don't know, Adam, I don't know." She shook her head. "All I  _do_ know is that tonight, you were dancing with a… common girl when you should have been staying by Amandine's side and setting an example for your people. Think of how humiliated that poor girl must be right now! And imagine what those villagers from Villeneuve think of their Prince, now that they've seen him favouring the attention of some artisan's daughter over his future bride. All well-wishing aside, you  _knew_  that it was wrong to be mingling with her so close to your wedding day! A reckless act like that can't go down without a punishment." She put her hand on his shoulder. "Just stay here tonight and focus on getting your rest. We'll talk things over in the morning."

* * *

Once he was alone and confined to his room, Adam kicked the closest table in a fit of rage.

 _Well done. You've really done it now_ , he thought.  _Why couldn't you control yourself? Why couldn't you keep your big fat mouth shut? Why did you even remotely believe that asking Belle to stay here would be a good idea?_

In the deepest darkest recesses of his mind, he knew why: because he was desperate. Because despite all the freedom and opportunities that were open to him as a prince, none of it gave him any real satisfaction. But  _she_  did.

But what had it all amounted to? Nothing. Belle was leaving tomorrow— _again_ —never to return. And Adam was going to spend the rest of his life waking up and falling asleep next to a woman he didn't love, trapped in an unhappy marriage, just like the one that had destroyed his parents. Then he'd eventually have to sire children to continue his legacy, and the same miserable cycle would start all over again. It wasn't fair to him, it wasn't fair to his future descendants, and it wasn't fair to Amandine.

 _If only I could make Belle trust me._   _If only I can convince my mother that I really do love Belle, and don't just see her as "another conquest." It's Amandine who's the one who's wrong for me, not Belle!_

But there wasn't enough  _time._

And the one thing that would give him more time was lying on a desk in the castle library. And the only way to that library was blocked by the guards standing outside his bedroom door.

Desperation growing, Adam hurried to the balcony, wondering if he could climb up the roof to reach the book that way. But one look at the closest turret and he knew it was impossible. It was one thing to scale walls and leap from rooftop to rooftop with a bear-like body and razor-sharp claws. But to do it as a human would not only be crazy, it would be suicide. Adam may have been desperate, but he wasn't stupid.

Options spent, the Prince returned to the West Wing and sat on his bed, wringing his hands in despair. He'd left his old world to escape one dead end, only to stumble straight into another one. All he could do now was dread the long long night ahead of him.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: This chapter contains some brief scenes of violence and references to child abuse. Please read at your own discretion.

The servants came to the Prince's chambers at six o'clock in the morning to prepare him for his wedding ceremony. They dressed him in a white suit with golden threads on the lapels and sleeves, and black buckled shoes that had been polished until he could see his face in them. Despite their best efforts, no amount of concealment powder could hide the dark circles under his eyes. He hadn't slept a wink last night—not that anyone bothered to question why. Adam doubted that any man could get a good night's sleep before their wedding day, regardless of whether the bride was someone they  _wished_ to marry or not.

After what felt like years, Henriette, wearing her finest dress, entered the room and whisked away the servants to share some private words with her son before the ceremony. Her face glowed with motherly pride as she straightened his cravat and searched his outfit for loose threads and stray pieces of lint.

"Chin up, Adam," she said as she moved a tea set from his bedside table to the dresser behind him. "I know this isn't the... easiest choice, but a marriage isn't the end of the world. Think of it as a new beginning. Amandine will be a good wife. She'll give your life a new purpose. As long as you have her, you'll never be alone."

Adam stared blankly at his mother's reflection in the vanity mirror. He felt as though the wool had been lifted from his eyes, and he was seeing her—truly seeing her for the first time.

"You're not my mother," he said bluntly.

Henriette turned around. "What was that, love?"

"I said, you're not my mother," he repeated firmly. "My real mother died of consumption thirteen years ago. You're just a shadow of her. You're a wish granted to me by an enchantress because I refused to accept her death. But... I've moved on from my loss. I don't need you anymore."

A crack appeared on Henriette's left cheek, glowing with a strange yellow light. The sight startled Adam, and he turned around to gape at her in shock.

The Queen winced and placed a hand over the blemish as though it had physically wounded her. When she opened her eyes again, her expression was one of hurt and betrayal. "How could you say such a thing?" she demanded. "You don't need me anymore? But I  _am_  your mother! If you cast me away, who else will be there to look after you?"

"I did have someone once," Adam replied quietly. "She raised me for thirteen years. She sang me lullabies every night. She showed me what it was to love and be loved in return. Not a day goes by when I don't think about her and those precious moments we shared." He looked back at Henriette. "But she just isn't  _you_. You're a dream I've clung to for far too long. And now, I have to wake up before it completely destroys me."

More light appeared on the false Queen's body, spreading to her arms, torso and lower limbs. She held up her glowing hands, eyes growing wide with fright. "No, Adam, wait!" she cried, extending an arm to him. But before she could muster a full scream, the lacerations engulfed her, and she disintegrated into a burst of golden dust.

Adam stood up, utterly bewildered as he watched the remains of his mother-imposter evaporate into the room. The Enchantress had warned him that he would lose his mother again one day. He just hadn't realized that  _verbally_  accepting her death was the key to undoing her magic.

It wasn't until the dust had settled that he realized he was shaking.

"Goodbye, Mère," he said before he hurried to the doors and slipped into the corridor.

* * *

It took Adam ages to get to the library, no thanks to his high-heeled shoes, which served as a perfect slipping hazard on the polished floors. He knew that the Enchantress had bewitched his subjects into believing that his real mother was still alive. But now that her double was gone, would their memories of the real Queen return? Or, if the memory spell was permanent, would they all believe that the false Queen had been murdered, and frame Adam as the prime suspect?

He had no time to question it, and no time to dwell on the implications of what he'd done. All he knew was that he had to get to the book and fast.

He heard doors opening behind him, followed by startled voices and exclamations. The noise sent him into a panic, so he hastened his speed, not stopping until he reached the library. Once inside, he slammed the doors behind him and breathed a deep sigh of relief.

The trouble was, someone was already there. No sooner had Adam locked the doors when he caught sight of Amandine standing behind the table beside the fireplace. She stared at him in wild-eyed bafflement.

"Amandine!" Adam said, sounding equally surprised as she looked. "I thought you would be down in the chapel by now."

"So did I," she replied quietly.

She was already in her wedding dress; a white  _robe de français_  with golden vines embroidered into the petticoat, likely designed to match the accents on the Prince's own wedding suit. Her mahogany-coloured hair was pinned up into a sophisticated bun, though she wore no veil, making Adam wonder if she had discarded it, or run off before her servants had finished attaching it to her. If it was the latter scenario, Adam knew he was in trouble. Not only would the servants be looking for him, but they'd be looking for her, too.

"I want to apologize for that appalling display I made at the ball last night," he said in a half-hearted attempt to lighten the mood. "It was entirely improper and—"

"You love her. Don't you?" Her hazel eyes surveyed him knowingly.

It took several seconds before Adam responded, so taken aback by the lucidity of her words. "How did you know?"

She slid around the table, giving him a good glimpse of the Enchantress's book tucked under her arm. Suddenly, her reasons for being in the library became perfectly clear.

"Adam," she said. "I know I may have a... reputation for being soft-spoken and demure, but I'm not a simpleton. I saw the way you looked at that artisan's daughter back in the village. You had this… lively, animated look on your face and you were smiling. I'd never seen you look at me that way before. Or anyone." She tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. "I admit that at first, I didn't understand it, but last night, when I saw you together again at the ball, it all made perfect sense."

She looked down at the book. "Is the Prince in this storybook you? Did you really make a deal with an enchantress to create a false version of your dead mother?"

"Yes… and no," Adam replied nervously. "I did make a deal with an enchantress to bring back my mother. But that was a different version of me. This reality… it isn't mine. In fact, I'm not supposed to be here at all."

Amandine pursed her lips, willing him to elaborate. Knowing he had little choice, Adam hesitantly revealed the story about the world he'd come from, one where he'd refused the Enchantress's offer and she'd turned him into a beast as punishment. In a last-ditch attempt to become human again, he'd used the book to travel back in time to stop the curse from happening. A decision that had brought him here.

If Amandine thought that Adam was pulling her leg, she certainly didn't show it. Maybe she had already suspended her disbelief in his story after reading the Enchantress's book. Or maybe his peculiar actions in the past week had convinced her that he was telling the truth.

"I thought that by changing my past, I could make a better future for myself," Adam concluded. "And it was better here, to a point. But then I began to see so many things that were wrong with my life, and I realized… that this wasn't really what I wanted at all."

"So then… you never really wanted to marry me?" asked Amandine. Her voice was sad, but not heartbroken.

"Amandine." Adam crossed the room and placed his hands on her shoulders. He vaguely noted that this was one of the most intimate gestures they'd shared since they'd started courting a week ago. "You are truly one of the most amazing women I've ever met. But we're just too different. You like going to the opera and painting. I like books and horseback riding. I know society says that love isn't a prerequisite for marriage, but I don't believe in that for one second. All I know is that if I marry you today, I'll be living a lie for the rest of my life. And worst of all, I'll be dragging you along with me."

"There is someone out there who's right for you," he continued. "Someone who will inspire you, move you, make you happy and change your world for the better. Whoever that someone is, he will be the luckiest man in all of France. But that man isn't me. And that's why I can't let this marriage continue, knowing it will ruin my— _both_  our chances of finding people who truly love us. Do you understand?"

"I…understand." Amandine nodded reluctantly. "But I'm also confused. If that's really how you felt about me, then why didn't you say so in the first place?"

"Because I didn't think anyone would believe me," Adam confessed. "And I didn't want to hurt anyone's feelings by telling them the truth. Especially my mother—or rather, the  _thing_  I pretended was my mother. She'd been waiting so long to see me get married… I suppose that deep down, I was afraid of disappointing her. I should have been more honest with everyone, especially you. Can you ever forgive me?"

A loud knocking on the doors interrupted the Prince and Princess from their conversation. It seemed that the servants had discovered Adam's hiding place.

"Blast!" Adam cursed as he turned back to his ex-fiancée. "Amandine, I  _need_  to find Belle. She's leaving Villeneuve today, and if I don't act now, I'll lose her forever. That book is the only way I can get to her."

Amandine lowered her eyes. "What do you want me to do?"

"Distract my servants. When they come in, tell them that you never saw me. Convince them that I was never here."

She bit her lip, nodded compliantly and passed the book to him.

As Amandine headed to the library doors to meet the servants, Adam flipped to the book's map and set it on the nearest table. He paused before putting his hand on the page, lost in thought.

He knew that the book could easily transport him to Villeneuve if he asked it to.  _But then?_  It wasn't like he could magically earn Belle's trust again, not after the poor choice of words he'd used with her at the ball last night. And revealing his real reasons for wanting her to stay at the castle would only frighten her more.

What he really needed was a clean slate. A chance to win Belle's favour without the social pressures and bad decisions he'd made in this timeline.  _But how?_ All he knew was that the book could take him back to events he had a strong emotional connection to, as long as they were events that had occurred in this timeline. Meaning, that if he wanted another chance to be with Belle, he'd have to change another part of his past. Something that had happened before the Enchantress's arrival and would guarantee that he'd still be human and still have access to her.

It was a tall order to fill; not to mention the risks involved. But if it meant seeing Belle again, it was worth it. Compelled by this idea, Adam closed his eyes and searched his past for a suitable memory. Despite having twenty-one years of experiences to explore, he found himself focusing on one particular conversation from yesterday's rehearsal.

_"He had the makings of a fine prodigy. He may have even rivalled the likes of Mozart himself, had he applied himself."_

_"You exaggerate, Mère. I was… an adequate player at best."_

It was all coming back to him now. He saw himself playing a piece by Handel on the harpsichord, the sheet music growing blurrier and blurrier with every mistake he made. He saw his father's angry face leering down at him as he knocked over his prized chessboard, the pieces scattering in all directions across the floor...

A clicking noise, followed by the sound of a key turning in a lock startled Adam back into the present. The servants would be here any second, and he only had one memory to work with. It wasn't exactly a happy memory, but it was better than nothing.

He placed his hand on the book and let its magic pull him into that realm of flickering suns and stars once again.

* * *

When he was back on solid ground, the Prince found himself standing outside the entrance to the bedchambers he used to dwell in before he'd inherited the West Wing. A quick glance out a nearby window told him that it was almost sundown. The sky was orange-tinged, and there were long shadows of shrubs and trees scattered across the grounds.

"I just don't know what we're going to do with you, boy," said an angry voice coming from inside his room. A voice Adam knew all but too well, even after eight years. "Your performance this afternoon was absolutely  _pathetic._  The Comte and Comtesse de Maillard thought you were  _ill_ , you played so poorly! Do you have any idea how humiliating it is, to know that my own son is incapable of playing a simple movement from one of the greatest composers of the century?"

"I'm sorry, Père." That was the voice of Adam at age thirteen. Even hearing his younger self was a surreal experience for the present-day Prince. He hadn't really talked that way back then, had he? "I practiced the Allegro with Maestro Cadenza all week, I swear! But seeing all those people watching me, it made me nervous."

"That's no excuse," his father replied dismissively. "A true prince always knows how to keep up appearances, no matter the circumstances. He always maintains an air of constraint and discipline around his subjects. That means showing no fear, no emotions!"

"No emotions?" the young Prince repeated, sniffling. "Then to be a prince is to not be human?"

"Silence!" barked the King. This was followed by a sharp slapping noise, and a grunt of pain coming from the young Prince. His father must have struck him in the back of his head or on the cheek… Adam couldn't remember now.

But he did remember this conversation, despite it happening half a lifetime ago. It had occurred a few weeks after his mother's funeral when the flowers were still growing over her grave and her loss was still fresh in the young Prince's mind. His father had invited some of his favourite nobles to the castle for an afternoon soirée, forcing Adam to be their entertainment. It was a day that was destined to end in utter disaster.

"Look at you, crying like some miserable, suckling babe," his father continued disgustedly. "You're thirteen years old for goodness sake! Monsieur Dupré tells me you haven't been paying attention to your etiquette lessons lately either. What good is spending all that money learning court mannerisms and social protocol if you can't even stand up straight? Are you even listening to me? Look at me when I'm talking to you,  _Thomas."_

The young Prince muttered something that Adam couldn't hear. The King must have missed it too, for he asked, "What did you say to me?"

"I said, my name is Adam, not Thomas," the young Prince repeated. "I never wanted your stupid name."

 _BANG!_  That was his father knocking over the chess table. And that clinking noise was the sound of thirty-two chess pieces rolling across the floor.

And now came the worst part of all. Adam didn't have to be in the room to see it; his father's ugly face bearing down on him, full of hatred and rage. He'd seen his father angry many times before, but never like  _this._

"How dare you!" the King growled.

"I-I'm sorry!" the young Prince stuttered back.

"No son of mine will  _ever_  use that language with me!"

"I didn't mean it! I swear!"

"It's all your damn mother's fault, making you all soft and undisciplined. Well, it's high time I show you what happens when you don't respect your elders!"

Adam's heart beat wildly in his chest. He knew exactly what happened next. He'd tried to make a run for the doors, but it was no use. His father had blocked the exit, and he was so much bigger and stronger than him. In what seemed no time at all, he grabbed him aggressively by the shoulder and pinned him against the wall, his arm outstretched as his open hand came flying towards him…

It was one thing for the Prince to experience what had happened in that room thirteen years ago. And another for him to hear it: flesh hitting against flesh followed by agonizing, blood-curdling screams. It was an inhuman sound, one that rattled him to the core and left him paralyzed with fear. This was where it all began, he thought, the sharp insults, the letdowns, the senseless abuse; everything that shaped him into that… loathsome form the Enchantress had condemned him to for all eternity.

But this time, he didn't have to be the helpless child at his father's mercy. He was a grown man with the power to stop what was happening in that room. Armed with this knowledge, Adam clenched his teeth and forced himself towards the doors. He didn't know what his action plan was exactly… only that he had to do  _something._ His hand hovered over the doorknob, blood pounding loudly in his ears…

"No, Lumière! Wait!" Cogsworth shouted.

Adam recoiled with a start. He hadn't realized that the servants could hear his younger self's cries, too. Nor did he know what the consequences would be if they saw him standing out here; an unfamiliar aristocrat, dressed far too formally to be attending a small dinner party. Instinct told him that it would be unwise to find out.

There were footsteps coming around the corner. Adam frantically searched the remaining length of the corridor for a quick getaway. A tapestry of his family coat of arms hung to his right-hand side. It wasn't big enough to conceal all of him, but it would suffice. He hid behind it, mere moments before the footsteps loudened and stopped in front of his bedchambers.

"Lumière, wait!" Cogsworth shouted again. He was grunting and panting heavily as though he and the maître d' were in the middle of a scuffle. "Don't go in there!"

"But Cogsworth," Lumière retorted, "he's hurting Master Adam!"

"And you're about to lose your job," Cogsworth said sharply. "It's not our place to interfere with the Master's disciplinary methods, no matter how much we disagree with them."

"Do you not  _hear_  what he's doing to him?" Lumière countered. "If we don't act now, the boy could end up incapacitated or grow ill just like his mother!"

"I'm sure it won't come to that," Cogsworth replied, though his tone of voice betrayed a hint of uncertainty. "Come. Let's go to the kitchens and see how Chef Cuisinier is making out with tonight's dinner. The Master will be down to eat with his guests soon. You know that he doesn't like to be kept waiting."

"If you say so,  _mon ami,"_ Lumiere said reluctantly.

It wasn't until the servants' footfalls had died away that Adam released the breath he'd been holding. He'd suddenly remembered something he'd overheard Mrs. Potts saying in the old timeline:  _"When the Master lost his mother and his cruel father took that sweet, innocent lad and twisted him up to be just like him, we did nothing."_

Yes, the Beast had been awake when Mrs. Potts had shared his tragic backstory with Belle in the West Wing. Normally he would have been furious that she'd disclosed such sensitive information without his permission, but instead, he'd felt relief. At least he didn't have to worry about revealing the sob story to the girl himself now. And given that Belle had already seen his torn family portrait, she'd probably jumped to her own conclusions on why he'd damaged it anyway. Mrs. Potts had got one small detail wrong however and that was her confessing her guilt over doing nothing to stop his father's abuse. For what power did a group of servants have against their own master; a man who could fire them all at a moment's notice or execute them for challenging his authority? No, this wasn't the servants' fault at all. Adam could never blame them for choosing silence over his own well-being.

Less than a minute after Lumière and Cogsworth's departure, the doors to the bedchambers opened. The Prince peered out from the tapestry to see his father, donned in his classic black wig and suit, walk in the opposite direction of his hiding place. A turmoil of emotions washed over Adam as he watched him; fear and anger being the strongest of all. He didn't know what he wanted to do more: beat the living daylights out of him or strangle him. Still, he waited until the King had disappeared behind the corner before slipping out from behind the tapestry and returning to the bedchamber doors.

Inside the room, young Prince Adam was crying. He would continue to do so until he'd fallen asleep. Adam wished he could say something to himself before then, but what? It wasn't like he could offer him some Mrs. Potts-worthy words of wisdom to cushion him from the years of misery he'd face at his father's hands. And a visit from his future self was more likely to frighten his younger self than comfort him. No, if the Prince really wanted to end the abuse, he'd have to attack it at its source. He was going to face the man he hated and feared most of all: his father _._

* * *

For once, Adam was glad that the King used to follow such a rigid schedule in life because it made it easy for him to determine the best places to catch him alone, and at what times. His dinner with the nobles would take anywhere from an hour to an hour and a half. After that, he would retreat to his study for the evening to answer some letters from his correspondents. It was in that room where Adam had the best chance of confronting him.

A secret passage near his old bedchambers allowed Adam to bypass a large section of the castle without being seen. Even when he had to sneak through the main corridors again, he was surprised to find the place deserted, with no guards or servants in sight. Perhaps everyone was too busy tending to his father's dinner party downstairs. Or perhaps they just happened to be working in another part of the castle at the same time he was sneaking to the study. Whatever the reasons, Adam was grateful for the added convenience it provided him.

At last, he reached the doors to his father's bureau. He twisted the doorknobs earnestly, only to realize that the room was locked.  _Damn._ He thought.  _What am I supposed to do now? Skip the study and try sneaking up on him in the West Wing?_  But then he remembered that he had the magic book with him and kicked himself for being so daft.  _Of course!_  He put his hand on the map, conjured a mental image of the office, and seconds later, found himself standing on the other side of the entryway.

Like all the things he'd possessed in life, King Louis-Thomas's study was a place he'd took great pride in maintaining and showing off to his visitors at any opportunity. Tall vertical shelves covered the walls, filled with costly knickknacks, small marble busts of deceased ancestors and books by various French philosophers and historians. To the left was a fireplace, which was already lit in anticipation of the King's arrival. On the mantelpiece was a small clock, and on the wall above it was a portrait of Adam's grandfather, Alexandre-Benoît, who regarded his grandson with a judgemental scowl. As a small child, Adam remembered asking his father why their ancestors never smiled in their portraits, to which his response was that no one would take them seriously if they did, and to stop wasting his time with silly questions. No silly questions—that was the key to a maintaining a peaceful relationship with his father back then.

The right side of the office was decorated with a Persian carpet that the King had purchased from a foreign merchant before Adam was born. On this carpet sat an armchair with a gold-painted frame and a writing desk covered with papers. Knowing that he had some time to kill before his father arrived, Adam walked to the desk to take a closer look at its contents. Most of it was fairly uninteresting: letters from distant kingdoms and invoices from places the King had done business with, but one item did stand out from the lot. It was a small portrait of his mother.  _I've seen this portrait before,_ Adam thought as he pulled it from the pile intriguingly.

It was an engagement portrait, one that Adam's maternal grandparents had sent to his father shortly after his betrothal, so he could see what his future spouse looked like. Henriette was in the prime of her life then, her cheeks rosy and her golden hair curled into luscious ringlets that stopped just short of her collarbones. Adam remembered looking at this portrait with his mother once and telling her how beautiful she'd looked, to which her response was to laugh and say that beauty didn't pay if it meant sitting in the same uncomfortable position for hours. He didn't understand her words at the time, but now, after spending half of his life being forcefully groomed in the same manner, he did.

 _Why did my father keep it?_ he wondered. Since his mother's death, he'd always acted as though she'd never existed. This portrait seemed to suggest otherwise.

As Adam set the painting back on the desk, his foot struck against something hard sitting on the floor. He looked down to see a half-finished bottle of whisky rocking in the space between the desk and the wall. There was another bottle next to it. Three, four, five, six... Adam counted at least a dozen whisky bottles in various states of emptiness behind his father's desk. He creased his brows in disbelief. He'd always thought of his father's study as a place both prestigious and clean, the image of a king who had all his affairs in order. Little did he know that his father had been putting on a show for him all this time. This was not the room of a proud king, but a broken man.

The search for cracks in Louis-Thomas's perfect life continued. Adam combed through the drawers of his writing desk next. The first drawer contained nothing but some spare parchment and writing utensils, but the second drawer contained a dagger.  _Père always liked to keep a weapon close by in case of an attack,_ he recalled.  _Too bad the tables are turning on him now._  He carefully picked up the blade and tucked it into his jacket pocket.

The next item of interest was a letter. But this one was different from the others on the desk because it had Adam's name in it. He picked it up curiously and read:

_To His Most Excellent Majesty, King Louis-Thomas Antoine de Bauffremont,_

_May it please Your Majesty,_

_To permit your brother-in-law, His Grace, Jean-Christophe Étienne de Breil de Pontbriand, Duke of Pré-sur-bois, to speak on the subject of your son, Prince Thomas-Alexandre Adam. With utmost respect for your mourning period for my beloved sister, I wish to remind you again of the offer I extended to you at her funeral regarding Thomas-Alexandre's future guardianship. Rest assured that my intent was not to question your capabilities as his father, but to offer you an alternate means of raising the boy, should you find the process too overwhelming on top of your many royal commitments._

_I am confident that Thomas-Alexandre will be well taken care of, should you choose to send him to live with me and my family in Pré-sur-bois. My son and daughter, Vincent and Léa, are very fond of his company, having greatly enjoyed visiting him at the_ Château de la Rose _in the summers when they were children. They see him as a brother-figure and would be more than happy to welcome him into our household pending your decision._

_As you are aware, my estate is less than a day's journey from Paris, which is home to the Sorbonne, one of the oldest and most prestigious universities in France. My son Vincent will be attending the school next semester and would be happy to have a companion join him in his studies. Should Thomas-Alexandre decide to pursue the life of a scholar at the university, he will learn not only the same curriculum he would have learned from his tutors but receive a more rounded education in all areas of the humanities. He will be more than prepared to run the kingdom once he becomes of age, a notion that I'm certain you will find most agreeable._

_I implore you to respond to my letter at your earliest convenience. However, if it is still your intent to raise Thomas-Alexandre on your own, then no further action is required, and I will cease any and all further communications on the subject._

_I wish His Majesty long life and happiness,_

_His Grace, Jean-Christophe Étienne de Breil de Pontbriand, Duke of Pré-sur-bois_

It took some time for Adam to register that the letter he held in his hand was real. He'd never known that his uncle had written letters to his father after his mother's death. Or rather, he'd never known because his father had never told him.

Christophe was Henriette's older brother and Adam's uncle by blood. Like his late sister, he had a warm and gentle disposition that the Prince felt was sorely lacking in his own father. He used to visit the castle every summer with his family; Adam vaguely remembered playing games with his cousins in the grounds when they were small children. That was back when his mother was still in good health and his days were filled with sunshine and laughter. But then Henriette passed away, Adam's days in the sun faded to nothingness, and his uncle's family stopped visiting him. He'd always assumed they'd wanted nothing to do with him after his mother's death. But was it possible that his father had  _wanted_  him to think that way this entire time?

The sound of a key turning in the door startled Adam from his thoughts. He hastily stuffed the letter back into the drawer, shut it and pressed himself against the wall beside the door frame. Moments later, the door opened and in walked the oblivious King. Adam's body filled with adrenaline as he drew the dagger from his jacket, waiting until the door had shut before speaking.

"Against the wall. If you make so much as a cry for help, I'll slit your throat."

King Louis-Thomas turned around with his start. His blue eyes bulged in their sockets as he caught sight of the intruder standing by the door with a dagger in hand.  _Not so tough when you're up against someone your own size now, are you?_ Adam thought with a satisfied smirk.

Dumbstruck, the King held up his hands and pressed himself against the wall. The Prince followed him across the room with the blade pointed firmly at his neck.

"Wh-who are you?" the King stammered. "What do you want?" He briefly took in the stranger's lavish outfit and his eyes grew even bigger. If Adam was a ruffian who planned on holding him hostage or stealing his valuables, he certainly didn't look like the part.

"Let's just say that I'm a messenger," Adam growled. "And I've come here tonight bearing grave tidings from the future. Your son is in danger. With every passing day, he grows closer and closer to eternal damnation. And it's all your doing." His voice began to shake. "What kind of sick person harms his own flesh and blood? You'll only hurt and frighten him, and to what end? By the time he comes of age, you'll have turned a perfectly sweet and innocent boy into a vile, irredeemable monster. He'll become a prisoner of his own castle, all thanks to you."

"Thomas-Alexandre is weak," his father replied bitterly. "He's overly sentimental, unmanly and impulsive. I can't have him wearing his heart on his sleeve when he inherits the throne. He needs to learn self-control, or he will never be a good ruler."

"He can be a far better ruler if he knows love!" Adam argued, choking back angry tears. "Since his mother passed away, the only things he knows are your curt remarks and the back of your hand. All that will teach him is to be cold and unfeeling. So cold that by the time he inherits the throne, he'll have no compassion for anyone—not for the ones who care about him, and not for the ones who need him the most. And do you know what the worst part is?" He inched the dagger closer to his father. "All those years of your bloody 'tutelage' will mean  _nothing_ , because by the time your boy sees the error of his ways, it will be too late for repentance. He will commit a crime so heinous, that by the time he can pick up the pieces, no one will even remember his name. He will die alone, anonymous and invisible to the world. And once he realizes this truth, your name will be the first he curses."

Louis-Thomas's mouth dropped open in horror. But whether it was for his son's bleak future, or for inadvertently bringing about the death of his own legacy, Adam didn't know or care.

"What must I do?" he asked him quietly.

"You have two options," Adam replied. "Number one: Treat your son the way a loving father should, not as a cold tyrant. You're all he has now. Comfort him when he grieves for his mother, don't condemn him. Or if you don't have the heart to do that, then why not send him to people who will? Let him stay with your brother-in-law for a few years. He can go to school in Paris and get an even better education than he'll get from Monsieur Dupré. Then, once he turns eighteen, he can move back here, and you can teach him all he needs to know to take over the throne. Think of what your wife would want."

The King didn't respond at first. His attention had shifted to Adam's eyes. His mouth dropped open again in realization.  _"Thomas?"_

The Prince glowered. "My name is Adam, you filth!" he shouted. Then, he punched his father squarely in the face. Louis-Thomas let out a grunt of pain and crumpled to the ground, clutching at his nose in agony. When he pulled his hands away, he was shocked to find them stained with blood.  _Serves him right,_  thought the Prince.  _Hopefully his blood permanently stains the carpet, so he won't forget what happened here._

"And believe me, if you ruin my life again, I have my ways of returning," he threatened. "I'll come back and kill you in your sleep. Meditate on that the next time you're in this room, drinking away your sorrows,  _Père."_

With that, he chucked the dagger into the floor so that it was mere inches away from slicing into the side of his father's head. The King barely flinched at the attack. He seemed to have forgotten how to move he was so shocked.

"Lord Almighty Jesus Christ," he muttered, eyes wide and unbelieving. "What have I done? What have I done?"

His repetitive muttering made Adam feel vaguely uncomfortable, so he exited the room, taking the magic book along with him.

 _So maybe I acted a bit harshly,_ he thought as he stood in the hallway and turned to the page of the map,  _but it's nothing he doesn't deserve._ One punch to the face was nothing compared to the hell his father had put him through for five years. And if it meant that he'd saved his thirteen-year-old self from years of abuse, then it was worth it. For without his father's cruel influence, Adam was certain that he would live a better life, one where he could be a decent man and pursue a proper relationship with Belle…

Hoping for all these things and more, the Prince placed his hand on the map, closed his eyes and thought of the present.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The name of the piece thirteen-year-old Adam plays at his father's party is the Allegro (Movement 3) from Suite No. 7 in G minor by George Frideric Handel. There's no specific reason why I chose this piece, other than I wanted something that was in a minor key, was fairly rigid-sounding and would be of an appropriate level for someone with roughly 7 years of playing experience. You can listen to a recording of the movement [here.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fKmqreU9l1Q)
> 
> A special shout out to the members of the Bittersweet and Strange forum for previewing this chapter and giving me their feedback. As always, I really appreciated your help!


	6. Chapter 6

Adam awoke to find himself warmly nestled under the blankets of his bed in the West Wing. He was momentarily confused; having no memory of going back to sleep, before the day's earlier events came rushing back: travelling back in time to when he was thirteen, confronting and punching his father in the face, saving his younger self from years of needless suffering…

As he recalled these things, an image of the King; bloody-nosed, mortified and muttering to himself on the floor appeared in Adam's mind's eye. At first, he'd felt uncomfortable to see his father so vulnerable after punching him, but now he felt surprised and strangely, sad.  _Does that mean I pity him?_ he wondered. He quickly banished the thought. He refused to feel any pity for the man who had single-handedly destroyed his childhood. The man deserved what he got, and Adam had no reason to dwell on the matter.

Putting his thoughts of his father behind him, the Prince stretched his limbs and rolled to his side, content to spend a few minutes enjoying the warmth of his bed before getting up and acclimatizing himself to this new reality. But as he peered over the mattress, he noticed something strange lying on the floor. It was a frilly black and white dress… and not far from that, an assortment of ladies' undergarments.

His eyes widened in shock.  _That isn't supposed to be there._

Now wide awake, Adam turned to the other side of the bed to see a tuft of frizzy black hair sticking out from the blankets.  _Is someone… in the bed with me?_ He pulled away the covers to find a woman with dark skin, thin brown eyebrows and full pink lips sleeping on the other side of the mattress. He recognized this woman. She was...

 _"Oh!"_  Adam shouted in alarm. He jerked away from the sleeper so fast that he fell straight off the bed. If his bedmate hadn't been woken by his shout, then she would have most definitely been woken by the loud "thud" sound he made as he hit the ground. Sure enough, as the Prince fought to free himself from his blankets, he heard the bed creaking, followed by a mellow voice asking,  _"Maître?_  Are you alright?"

After a moment's struggle, the Prince succeeded in pulling the blankets off his head. Peering down at him from the mattress, with an expression of utmost concern, was Plumette, the former castle feather duster and Lumière's longtime sweetheart.

"P-Plumette?" the Prince stammered as he gaped at her in disbelief.

"Plumette?" The maid scrunched up her face in confusion. "Why, no one's called me by that name since I was a little girl. My name is  _Babette,_  Your Highness."

"Oh. Well, then…  _Babette."_  It suddenly dawned on the Prince that he wasn't wearing any clothes. He hastily gathered up his blankets to cover up his nether regions, while hotly embarrassed that his maid had probably seen  _everything_ already. "What are you doing here?"  _In bed? With me?_

Babette tilted her head in confusion. "You asked for me last night? After the dinner party?"

"I did?" He blinked. "I mean, of course I did! And Lumière  _agreed_  to such an arrangement?"

"Lumière?" She frowned. Then, her eyes lit up with recognition.  _"Ah oui,_ Lumière, the old maître d'hôtel! He stopped working here years ago. Why would he need to agree with me staying with you?"

"No reason," Adam replied. But internally, he couldn't shake the feeling that something was  _very_ wrong with this picture. Lumière no longer worked at the castle, and from the sound of it, Plumette—who now called herself Babette—was the Prince's courtesan; a position he'd  _never_  forced on any of his servants before, even when he was at his most selfish.

"Perhaps you hurt your head when you fell," Babette said, pursing her lips thoughtfully. "Shall I send for the physician?"

"Oh no no no,"—he shook his head dismissively—"that won't be necessary. Just a bad dream, that's all. Where are my clothes?"

Babette gestured to a pile of crumpled garments lying in front of the bed. Among them was a lilac-coloured dinner jacket. Adam grimaced, wondering what would possess him to wear such a repulsive colour, but reminded himself that anything was better than wearing nothing right now. He crawled over to put on the clothes, Babette's uneasy gaze following him the entire time.

He had just finished getting dressed when he heard a knock on the door. Happy to distract himself, as Babette was starting to make him feel  _very_ uncomfortable, he got up to answer it. On the other side of the doorway stood a portly man with a wide chin and dark hair pulled back into a ponytail. He was dressed as a servant, and although he seemed familiar to Adam, he couldn't recall seeing him in the castle before.

"Good morning, Master!" the servant said with a loud and buoyant-sounding voice. "You're looking considerably bewildered and bedraggled on this fine Wednesday morning."

 _"You."_  Now Adam knew why this man was so familiar. "You were with that soldier when he proposed marriage to Belle back in Villeneuve. What on earth are you doing here?"

"Hmm... well I think  _someone_  had a bit too much Chardonnay to drink last night," the servant replied, scratching his chin thoughtfully. "Allow me to introduce—or should I say,  _reintroduce_  myself. My name's Yannick LeFou and I'm your maître d', remember?" He emphasized every word slowly like he was speaking to a small child. "Can I get you anything? Some breakfast? Tea for you and the mistress?"

Utterly exasperated and unsure of how to respond, Adam shut and backed himself against the door.  _What the devil is going on?_ He'd expected to encounter a few differences from altering the past, but he hadn't expected things to change  _this_  much.

LeFou knocked on the door again. "Um… also, your uncle's waiting for you in your study," he added hesitantly. "He'd like a word with you… sometime today preferably."

Adam barely had time to process this new information before he sensed movement coming from the bed. He looked up and let out a startled shout. Babette had just rose from the blankets, exposing more of her female anatomy to him than he'd ever cared to see before.

"Good lord!" he exclaimed, turning away and placing a hand next to the side of his face in sheer mortification. "Put some clothes on.  _Please."_

 _"Bien sûr Maître!"_ Babette replied. She darted around the bed to retrieve her dress and underclothes without a moment's hesitation.

Adam didn't know what he wanted to do more: vomit into the closest chamber pot or summon Chapeau to draw him a bath. Most likely vomit first.

* * *

One very confusing half-hour later, Adam found himself sitting in his study, across from a now middle-aged Uncle Christophe, who appeared to be very unhappy with his only nephew. It was difficult for Adam to understand why, due to the fragmented nature of his uncle's rambling, but from what he gathered, he'd partaken in some reckless drinking the week before that had got him into serious trouble. Christophe had sent Adam to Germany to meet with the Queen of Eisenten, who owned a plot of uncleared land near the French-Germany border. Adam was supposed to explain to the Queen his reasons for needing her land and to negotiate the terms of its ownership. Instead, he'd gotten extremely drunk at dinnertime, spending the evening making inappropriate comments at his hosts and flirting with the Queen's daughter, well aware that she was already engaged to someone else. Needless to say, the Queen was not impressed. The negotiations for her land never took place.

"It serves me right for letting you go to Germany unchaperoned," said Christophe, putting a hand over his face exasperatingly. "Here it was, a perfect opportunity for you to finally do something to benefit the kingdom, and you couldn't even do  _that_  right! When are you going to stop acting like a child and start taking your responsibilities seriously? You're a prince of France for goodness sake, not a silly drunkard!"

"You're right, Oncle."

The Duke looked up at his nephew in surprise. "What did you say?"

Adam shrugged. "You've articulated your points clearly enough. I should focus on establishing a good rapport with our neighbouring kingdoms, not on superficial things like drinking and flirting with young women. The display I made back in Germany was disgraceful, uncouth and completely disrespectful of my hosts, whom I'm sure put a great deal of time and effort into welcoming me to their kingdom. In fact, I intend to write a letter to Queen Wilhelmine today, expressing my sincerest apologies and to ask her for a second chance to discuss an agreement for the ownership of her land."

Christophe's mouth hung open in shock. "Who are you, and what have you done with my nephew? You know what? Don't bother answering that question. I don't want to know! As it happens, Queen Wilhelmine will be visiting Versailles next week for the Emperor's birthday celebration. You'll have one more chance to smooth things over with her then,  _provided_ that she's willing to speak with you again first."

"Then I will ensure my next impression on her will be better than my first," Adam declared.

"And I'll eat my hat when that happens," the Duke replied sarcastically. "LeFou!" He gestured to the maître d', who was standing diligently by the bureau door. "Summon my carriage for me, please. Pré-de-bois awaits."

"Your wish is my command, Your Grace," LeFou replied with a bow.

"LeFou?" Adam quickly added. "Would you ready my horse for me as well?"

LeFou gave his master a quizzical look. "But what about your meeting with the Comte de Crevoisier? He'll be arriving at the castle in less than an hour."

"Tell him to wait," Adam replied dismissively. "I have urgent business with an artisan in Villeneuve regarding… a new commission for the castle. I must get there with all possible haste."

"And since when have you had any interest in doing business with your subjects?" Christophe inquired, who now looked just as surprised as LeFou. "The last time we spoke, you said that they reminded you of 'unintelligent pigs who roll in the muck all day, unaware of their own filth.'"

"I do partake in things outside of excessive drinking and complaining about the cleanliness of my subjects, you know," the Prince replied dryly.

LeFou let out a loud guffaw, then silenced himself upon seeing Christophe's dumbstruck expression. After a moment, the Duke rolled his eyes and shook his head.

"Keep an eye on my nephew, will you LeFou?" he said as he rose to his feet.

"For you, Your Grace, I will keep  _two_  eyes open."

The Duke pat LeFou on the shoulder and exited the room.

Meanwhile, Adam leaned back in his seat and sighed in relief. There was obviously some new history between him and his uncle in this timeline that he hadn't uncovered yet _,_ but he'd look into that later. Right now, finding Belle was his top priority.

* * *

The journey to Villeneuve seemed to take forever. A part of Adam wondered if it would have been safer to go by carriage instead of horseback. But at the same time, he wasn't in the mood to be drawing unwanted attention to himself and riding alone would be quicker than riding with a driver anyway.

Upon reaching the village square, the Prince realized that he had no idea where Belle's house was. He'd been so engrossed in their conversation the last time he'd been here, he hadn't thought of memorizing its location in case he needed to find her in the future. Too embarrassed and proud to ask the villagers for help, he decided to retrace his steps by leading his horse in the general area he last remembered walking with her.

Several wrong turns and backtracks later, he finally came across the tired-looking house at the edge of the town.

But it was different now. The doors and windows were boarded up by wooden planks. There were shingles missing from the roof. The front garden, which was previously filled with fresh green cabbages, was now barren and empty. All clear indicators that no one had lived here in a long time. Adam's stomach lurched unpleasantly.  _If Belle doesn't live here anymore, then where is she?_

He heard a peal of laughter and turned to see Gaston walking with his arm draped over a dark-haired woman in a frilly pink dress and bonnet. Looking more closely at the woman, Adam noticed that she had a powdered face, pink cheeks and dark red lipstick, making her resemble more of a doll than a human being. Adam fidgeted with his hands nervously. He couldn't say that he was terribly fond of Gaston since he'd seen him trying to kiss Belle back at the chapel. But at the same time, he was probably the only person in his vicinity to know anything about her whereabouts. He swallowed his pride and approached the party apprehensively.

"You there! Monsieur... Légume, was it?"

"Your Highness!" Upon seeing the Prince, Gaston stooped himself down into a low bow, forcing the woman to do the same. "It's such an honour to have you in our village. How do you know my name?"

"Well, you have to know these things when you're a prince, you know."

"What's my name, Your Highness?" said Gaston's partner, taking a step towards Adam and gazing at him with wide eyes.

"Umm…" Adam wrinkled his nose. "Marie?"

The woman gasped. "Gaston, he really  _does_  know everything!"

"Indeed. How may we be of service to you, Your Highness?" Gaston asked jovially. "Is there a traitor running loose in the kingdom? Is our country on the brink of war with the British? I don't mean to brag, but I served as a  _legendary_  captain in the war against the Portuguese twelve years ago. I would be more than willing to serve and fight against any fiends who may be a threat to our kingdom's safety."

"While I greatly appreciate your past contributions to defending France, I'm afraid that that war is not what I've come here to discuss," Adam replied awkwardly. "I'm looking for information on the whereabouts of a Maurice and Belle Gagnier who used to live in the house behind me. Do you have any idea what happened to them?"

"Maurice?" Gaston raised an eyebrow. "He passed away over a year ago. He's buried in the cemetery behind the church. And as to his daughter Belle, well who knows what happened to her? She left town a few months after her father's funeral and no one's heard of her since. A pity, too." He frowned. "She was such a pretty thing. I proposed to her many times, telling her how our marriage would save her from a life of spinsterhood and homelessness, but the stubborn girl kept refusing me."

Marie cleared her throat.

"Um, but of course, her beauty could never compare to my darling Marie-Élise's," Gaston added, turning to his companion tactfully. "She is the  _true_  love of my life. The only one worthy of being my wife and bearing my future children."

"Oh, Gaston." Marie-Élise giggled. "You flatter me."

"Come here  _mon petit chou_. _"_  Gaston grabbed Marie-Élise's hand and trailed several kisses down the side of her arm, eliciting more delighted giggles from the young woman.

Not wanting their flirtations to become more awkward than they already were, Adam quickly asked, "Do either of you happen to know where she went?"

"Ah, yes," Gaston replied, releasing Marie-Élise's arm. "I believe it was to—what was the name of that town again...? It started with an 'R.'"

"Rabelais?" Marie-Élise suggested.

"That's the one! Last I heard, Belle had gone there to work for a carpenter or someone of that nature. Never did catch the name, unfortunately."

"Carpentry is a filthy occupation if you ask me," said Marie-Élise, crossing her arms distastefully. "But then again, that girl never seemed to act the way a proper lady should. She was always walking around town with her nose stuck in a book or building the most  _unsightly_ -looking machines. Villeneuve's been a much better place without her."

"Thank you both for your information," Adam said with a curt nod. "I'm afraid I must be on my way now."

"Wait, Your Highness?" Gaston said before he took off. "If you ever find yourself in need of a new captain of the guard for your castle, I would be more than happy to oblige you!"

It took every ounce of Adam's self-control to not roll his eyes. "Thank you," he replied. "I will send word if there's ever a need."  _Hopefully never!_

After parting ways with Gaston and Marie-Élise, Adam walked his horse to the open field behind Belle's old house, thinking about everything he'd just learned about. He immediately felt a deep sense of pity for Belle, knowing that she had lost her father in this universe. While he knew little of the man himself, he did know that Belle thought the world of him. If losing Maurice to eternal imprisonment was painful enough, then losing him forever must have been utterly unbearable.

At the same time, Adam was glad that Belle hadn't let her father's death stop her from pursuing her passions. Perhaps she was in the middle of designing the world's next great invention right now or travelling the world to see all the places she'd read about in her books. He wished he could know for certain, but Rabelais was a big city with many different carpenters. Without knowing the exact name of the carpenter who had apprenticed Belle, it could be ages before he could track down her whereabouts.

 _If only I still had the mirror,_ he thought regretfully. If he did, all he'd have to do was ask it to show him Belle, and he could piece together enough clues from her reflection to find her current location.

But while he didn't have the mirror anymore, he did have the book. He looked pensively out at the green pasture in front of him.

He had never used the book to transport him to a person before. Come to think of it, he couldn't remember if the Enchantress had ever said that he  _couldn't_ use it for that purpose. All he remembered her saying to him was that the book could transport him to wherever his heart desired. What if that rule didn't just apply to times and places, but to living things too?

Curious to know if there was any truth to his speculating, Adam retrieved the magic book from his horse's saddlebags and turned to the page of the map (He'd moved the book there for safekeeping after finding it wrapped in his blankets that morning). Then, realizing that it would be unwise to leave an expensive horse in the middle of a field while he magicked himself to Belle's location, he turned to his steed and put a hand on his neck.

"Sorry, Magnifique," he apologized sheepishly. "This might get a little... strange."

He conjured a mental picture of Belle as she'd looked at last night's ball, dressed in her blue Sunday dress with her hair pinned behind her head. Almost immediately, starlight bled from his fingertips on to the map, and then the world began to spin rapidly…

* * *

When the spinning stopped, and Adam could see clearly again, he and Magnifique were on the empty outskirts of a large city. Beside them was a dirt road that led to a cluster of tall buildings. Across from the road was a small, three-storey structure with the words  _"La Bouteille Bon Marché"_  painted in faded gold letters above the entrance.

Adam furrowed his brows in confusion. The book hadn't taken him to a carpenter's shop as he'd expected it would. It had taken him to a  _tavern._

 _Why would the book bring me here?_  Belle didn't strike him as the kind of person to engage in the rowdy activities that went on in these establishments. Maybe she was meeting someone inside? Or maybe she was travelling, and this tavern was a side stop to some bigger, more important destination?

There was only one way to find out. Adam left his bewildered horse in the stables beside the tavern and headed inside.

A strong smell of tobacco and ale reached his nose as he passed through the front doors. He was in a dimly-lit room with a counter on one side and a staircase leading to the upper floors on the other. As it was still early in the day, there were only a handful of patrons sitting and conversing with each other at the tables. Their chatter immediately died down upon seeing the Prince, who stood out like a sore thumb in his overly expensive attire. He flashed them an awkward smile to break the tension. If Belle really was somewhere in this tavern, he hoped that she wasn't planning to stay long.

"Why good morning Your Highness!" said a cheerful-sounding voice. A middle-aged woman with flyaway blonde hair and a tray of beer tankards approached him. "What a pleasure to see you in our tavern! My name is Madame Lefevre and I'm the co-owner of this fine establishment. How may I help you today? If it's a drink you're craving, may I recommend the Hefeweizen? It's a nice and refreshing beer imported straight from Germany."

"Thank you, Madame Lefevre," Adam replied courteously. "If it's not too much trouble, I would like a private word with someone in this building. Her name is Belle Gagnier."

Madame Lefevre seemed to know exactly who Adam was talking about, because she turned to the back of the tavern and shouted, "Oi, Belle!  _Viens ici!"_

A barmaid scrubbing a table at the far side of the room lifted her head curiously. It took a moment for Adam's eyes to adjust to the shadows so he could see her face clearly. His jaw dropped.

It was Belle.

Only she didn't look like Belle anymore. Her dull, greasy hair was tied up into a loose bun, and she was wearing a tightly-fitted salmon pink dress that drew a great deal of attention to her shoulders and cleavage. Her face was pale and gaunt and there were dark circles under her eyes. She looked a lot thinner too, and not in a healthy way.

Upon seeing the Prince, Belle's eyes widened in shock. Then, her expression darkened into something that looked like revulsion.

"Well, I'm not paying you to spend all day gawking about," Madame Lefevre said, staring at her impatiently. "Get your rear end over here before I kick it for you!"

This remark was enough to bring Belle back to her senses. She tucked her washcloth into her apron and walked rigidly to the front of the tavern, hands shaking from where they hung at her sides. This struck Adam as odd. It was normal for his subjects to gape at him whenever he made a public appearance. But Belle seemed to be more afraid of him than fascinated.  _Why is that?_

"Good morning, Mademoiselle Gagnier," he said in an attempt to lighten the mood. "I'm sorry to pull you from your work."

Belle said nothing. Her eyes were fixed on the floor, as though she was waiting for it to swallow her whole.

"Belle!" Madame Lefevre said sharply. "His Royal Highness just said something to you. Aren't you going to respond?"

"Not at all, Your Highness," Belle replied quietly. "It's a great… honour to be in your presence."

"Much better." The landlady smiled approvingly. "Belle, today is your lucky day. Prince Adam is in need of your services. He's requested a private appointment with you."

Belle looked up in alarm. "A what?"

"Are you deaf, girl? This is your job now, whether you like it or not! Now go upstairs and get yourself ready. And don't you worry about finishing the tables. I'll leave Béatrice and Marie-Françoise to take care of them."

"Yes, Madame," Belle replied, though her tightly pursed lips seemed to say that she'd rather do anything else. Still, she curtsied and headed upstairs, letting out several hacking coughs along the way.

"Why do you speak to her so harshly?" Adam asked once she was out of earshot. "She's only a girl."

"A girl she may be, Your Highness, but she still needs to know the ways of our business," Madame Lefevre replied matter-of-factly. "Belle's new to our tavern, see. She's only worked here for a few months and still holds this high and mighty notion that she's  _better_ than everyone else. It's all those books she used to read I tell you. That, and not having a mother to raise her and teach her the mannerisms expected of a young lady. If not for her pretty looks bringing in extra customers, I would have sacked her ages ago. But enough with my blabbering." She looked to the stairs. "She's in room number six when you're ready. If she's any trouble at all, just let me know."

The way Madame Lefevre worded her last sentence made Adam wonder how much trouble Belle had _had_ trouble with customers in the past. It was only slightly less disconcerting than knowing that she was having _private appointments_ with them _,_ appointments that from the sound of it, went beyond the simple business of cleaning tables and serving them food. 

* * *

Adam climbed the stairs and passed through a dingy hallway with a dusty red carpet. Room number six was on the right-hand side. He knocked on the door.

"Come in," Belle called from inside.

Opening the door, Adam found himself in a bedchamber that was even smaller than the crumbling, dusty attic he had explored with Belle back in Paris. Even more shocking than the room's tiny size was the fact that it was devoid of any decorations that would give insight into its owner's personality. There were no books, no sketches, no prototypes of future inventions lying around, nothing that shouted out to him as uniquely "Belle." All there was was a vanity, a bed with unwashed bed sheets, a small window and an open wardrobe containing some battered-looking dresses. It was a room that could belong to any working girl he supposed, but not to  _her._

"Well, aren't you going to undress?" Belle asked impatiently.

She sat on the bed with her legs crossed. Now that they were alone, she seemed to have no qualms about looking angry again, for reasons Adam still didn't understand.

"I beg your pardon?" he replied.

"Undress?" She cocked an eyebrow. "That's how this works, right? You take your clothes off, you take my clothes off, we do our little 'horizontal dance' in bed until you get bored of me and toss me aside like a used handkerchief? Isn't that how you treat all your whores?"

"I'm not here to bed you," Adam said quietly.

"Really?" There was a flicker of disbelief in her eyes, but then her expression hardened again. "Then... why are you here?"

"Because…" He paused, searching for words and kicking himself for not preparing a good cover story. "I wanted to ask you a question. Which is… how would you like to work for me at my castle?"

Belle crossed her arms, clearly unimpressed with the idea. "Tired of laying with your concubines, so now you have to scour village taverns to find new girls to keep your bed warm? How embarrassing for you."

"This isn't for a job as a… sex worker," Adam replied tactfully. "It's for a job as a librarian. I'm looking for someone with a bright mind and a passion for literature to help me re-organize the books in my library. A… very reliable source told me that you would be perfect for the job."

"A reliable source?" Belle let out a laugh, followed by another series of coughs. "I'm sorry to say, Your Highness, but your sources are running on outdated information. I gave up on believing in fairy tales and that 'adventure in the great wide somewhere' rubbish ages ago, once I realized that it wasn't going to help me put bread on the table."

Adam frowned. He could feel that he was losing her and didn't want to after everything he'd gone through just to find her again in this universe. "Mademoiselle Gagnier, I can assure you that I will double—no  _quadruple_ whatever wages Madame Lefevre pays you here," he insisted. "And not only that, but all your meals will be covered as part of your expenses. You'd work with a kind and supportive staff and have comfortable clothes and a proper room."

"It does sound convincing when you put it that way," Belle agreed. "But you've left out one key detail. I'd never  _serve,_  so much as  _live_  with the man who killed my father."

"What?"

"Oh, come off it! Are you really that oblivious? Do the words 'horseback riding' and 'old man on the road' ring a bell to you at all?"

"You'll need to... enlighten me."

Belle stood up and paced the floor. "Last June, my father and I were travelling to La Fontaine," she began. "We were going there to sell a prototype for an invention we'd built together, one that would have made us a lot of money. But as we were passing through the woods near your castle, one of our trunks fell out of the wagon. My father walked onto the road to retrieve it. And who should have shown up but  _you."_ She looked back at him. "You and that... ruddy cousin of yours, Duke something-or-other. You were both riding your horses at breakneck speeds, right into my father's path. He tried to get out of the way, but he wasn't fast enough. Your horse knocked him over as you rode past him." Her voice grew angry again. "You didn't stop, didn't even look back."

Adam listened in dumbstruck horror as Belle continued to outline the aftermath of his accident with Maurice. He assumed that she either hadn't told anyone this story before, or was looking to get a load off her chest, because her words were vivid and full of detail. The impact of his horse had thrown Belle's father off the road; quite hard it seemed because when she ran to him, he was bleeding badly and could no longer feel his legs. It took her hours to hoist him back into the wagon and rush him back to Villeneuve. By then, she was too late. The doctor took one look at Maurice and told Belle that his injuries were too severe to treat. If he did end up surviving, he would be crippled and in great pain for the rest of his life. Maurice tried to put up a good fight, but despite his efforts, died three days later. Naturally, Belle put all the blame on the Prince.

In the months after her father's death, Belle tried to make money from selling vegetables in her garden and doing odd jobs for her neighbours. But as summer turned to autumn, she realized that she wasn't making nearly enough money to sustain herself. She couldn't even rely on her prototype invention as a source of income anymore, as she had left it in the woods to lighten the wagon when she'd taken her father back to Villeneuve. Gaston had come calling for her many times in this period, trying to convince her to marry him, but she refused. Despite her financial difficulties, she was determined to find another way to provide for herself, one that didn't involve spending the rest of her life with a boorish, brainless man she didn't love.

One day, as Belle was going through a box of her father's possessions, she discovered a letter from his old friend, Alain Monteil, who worked as a carpenter in Rabelais. Belle remembered that Monsieur Monteil often took on apprentices to run his shop and wondered if he would be willing to take her, given his past relationship with Maurice. She sent him a letter, and some weeks later, received one back, saying he would be delighted to have her as an apprentice. Belle was ecstatic. She sold her house, took what few possessions she still owned, and moved to the city.

For the first few months of her apprenticeship, Belle was happy. Monsieur Monteil was a great mentor and was quick to defend her from the more bigoted apprentices at his shop, who believed that carpentry was no place for a young woman. Belle hadn't even worked at the shop for a full season, however, when Monsieur Monteil died from an unexpected heart condition. The shop passed on to his son, who, unlike his father, refused to take on a lady apprentice. Belle was curtly dismissed. Because she had no money to travel back to Villeneuve, she took on another job as a seamstress at a dress shop in town. Only the head seamstress was highly mistrustful of her, and after finding her reading some "unsavoury" literature (which was really just an innocent book of children's stories), declared her unfit to work at her business. Unemployed once more, Belle was left with one last option: working as a barmaid at a tavern on the outskirts of Rabelais.

At first, Belle's responsibilities at  _La Bouteille Bon Marché_  were limited to cleaning tables, serving drinks to customers and cooking meals. But once she realized that she was running out of money to cover her apartment rent, she'd pleaded with Madame Lefevre to give her a raise. Instead, the landlady gave her a proposal. She would increase her wages and  _offer_ her a room at the tavern if she agreed to engage in sexual favours with customers during her work hours. Belle was revolted. She refused her offer, but as the weeks passed, and the price for her rent increased, realized she had no other option.

Belle did not go into the specifics of what her first sexual encounter was like, but Adam could guess from her facial expressions and body language that it was a horrible experience; one that she desperately wanted to forget. She'd been living and working here ever since; a lowly barmaid-prostitute, barely a shell of the person she used to be.

By the time she had finished her story, Belle was on the brink of tears. "Do you why I had to give up my books and inventions?" she asked him. "Do you know why I have this disgusting job? It's all because of you. Because you didn't stop for my father in the woods."

"I'm sorry," Adam apologized. "I had no idea—"

"Of course you wouldn't!" she snapped. "Have you ever cared about your subjects or seen them as anything more than personal objects? You may look like a prince, but I see right through that stupid façade of yours. All you are is a spoiled and selfish  _beast_. And if my words make you angry, so be it. Drag me to your castle. Make me another one of your sex slaves. Sentence me to death for all I care. I've lost my father and my pride. It won't be much longer before I lose everything else, too."

"I can fix this."

"Really?" She coughed. "How? Can you bring back the dead? Can you turn back time and stop your bloody horse from knocking over my father? I don't think so." She glared at him. "I hate you, Prince Adam. I hate you and I will never forgive you!" With that, she fell to the ground, sobbing loudly as she succumbed to her grief.

Adam slowly approached her, trying to hold in his own despair as he reached down to touch her on the shoulder. But Belle smacked his hand away before he could. "Leave me alone!" she shouted.

His lower lip trembled. "I'm sorry, Mademoiselle." He dropped a bag of coins on her vanity, the sound of her cries still ringing in his ears long after he'd left her room.


	7. Chapter 7

_Once upon a time, in the hidden heart of France, a handsome young prince lived in a beautiful castle. For most of his childhood, the Prince lived a happy and carefree existence. He had everything his heart desired, spending his days in the company of his devoted servants and his beloved mother, who cherished him more than life itself._

_But everything changed in the Prince's thirteenth year when his mother died from an unexpected illness. The young Prince barely had time to come to terms with his grief, when his father decided that his son's childhood had come to an end. He sent him to university to receive the education necessary to become king._

_While the Prince looked forward to the opportunities open to him as university student, he was also greatly confused by his present circumstances. He couldn't understand why his father had sent him away so suddenly, whereas before, he'd intended to teach him how to manage the kingdom himself. Perhaps the Prince was being punished for not living up to his father's expectations? Or maybe his father's promise to mentor his son been an empty one, one that had no meaning to him now that his wife was gone?_

_Determined to prove his worth to the King, the Prince buried himself in his studies, coming top of class in many of his courses. But despite his accomplishments, his father never visited him nor wrote him any letters acknowledging his hard work. As time passed, the Prince eventually lost interest in his academics. He grew increasingly sad and bitter, feeling that his father had abandoned him. While he did have a supporting aunt and uncle to stay with outside of school, he always felt that he was a burden to them and that their reasons for taking him in were more from charity than from wanting another son. They assured him many times that this wasn't the case, but it still wasn't the same as belonging to a real mother and father._

_In his fifteen year the Prince began to spend his time with his cousin and a group of schoolmates who enjoyed frequenting the local brothels and taverns in the streets near the university. It was there, outside of his father's watchful eye, that the Prince soon became well-acquainted in the ways of drinking and debauchery. These activities became more than a sport to him; they became a refuge from the years of loneliness, hurt, rejection and loss his parents had given him._

_When the King passed away unexpectedly when the Prince was seventeen, he was forced to drop out of university to take over his responsibilities. Only he had no idea where to start. His father had left him with no instructions, no words of wisdom on how to rule a kingdom. Against the advice of his uncle, closest servants, and royal advisors, the Prince chose to revert to the reckless lifestyle he'd led in university, drinking excessively with guests at his castle and taking young women to bed every night. Deep down, he knew that what he was doing was wrong, but had no idea how to improve himself. He was a boy trapped in a man's body, caught in a downward spiral, one that he could not escape from._

Unable to read any further, Adam closed the Enchantress's book and flung himself down on the mattress. Moments later, the doors opened behind him.

"Oh, welcome back, Master!" said the upbeat-sounding voice of Yannick LeFou. "You came back earlier than expected. Did you get what you wanted from Villeneuve?"

When Adam didn't answer, LeFou continued, "Just so you're aware, the Comte de Crevoisier is here to see you. But no pressure or anything. If you want to stay up here for a little longer, I'll tell him you're busy."

The Prince pressed his hands over his eyes and groaned. "I'm a fool," he muttered.

"Begging your pardon?"

"I said, I'm a  _fool,"_ he repeated. "I'm an overgrown child with paternal issues who's spent the last eleven years drinking and sleeping with women I don't give a damn about. I don't deserve the throne. I'm hardly even deserving of being a prince."

"Alright, this is unexpected," LeFou said perplexedly. "This isn't because of what your uncle said to you this morning, is it? You know you shouldn't take it personally. He's just been under a lot of pressure lately, what with dealing with you and dealing with your cousin back home. I wouldn't be too happy either if I was in his shoes."

"What difference does it make what my uncle said or not?" Adam snapped. "Anyone can see that I'm a despicable, self-absorbed aristocrat who cares nothing about the wellbeing of my people." If Belle had said it herself, then it must have been true.

"Oh, come on, you're not that bad," LeFou said reassuringly. "Besides... I like you."

The Prince cocked an eyebrow. "You…  _like_ me?"

"Of course!" He nodded. "I mean, I don't  _like_  like you, but as far as princes go, you're the  _crème de la crème._ Just think about it. Some princes spend all their time locked up in their offices, answering letters, talking with heads of state, overseeing regional trials.  _So_  boring. But you, you like to throw big parties with lots of music and food. You know  _exactly_ how to have fun! That, and you've got a great fashion sense." He subtly gestured to Adam's ugly purple jacket.

Adam failed to see how anything of those things made him better than a prince who actually took his job seriously, but on the upside, at least LeFou had his attention now. "LeFou," he said as he sat up from the bed, "forgive my forgetfulness, but exactly how long have you worked as my maître d'?"

"Hmm, I'd say about seven years." LeFou counted on his fingers thoughtfully.

"And you lived in Villeneuve before?"

"Born and raised."

"Did you happen to know a Belle Gagnier when you lived there?"

"Well  _of course_  I knew Belle! Everyone did," LeFou confirmed. "Very pretty girl, but a bit touched in the head if you get my French. She was always walking around town with her face behind a book. Some of the villagers said she was doing it on purpose because she wanted to avoid small talk. Can't imagine why though. Sure, our town wasn't  _swimming_  with intellectuals and university professors, but it's not like we'd done anything to  _offend_ her." He looked back at Adam. "Why are you asking?"

The Prince shrugged. "I heard someone mention her when I was at the village and thought she sounded like an interesting character," he lied. "But... she doesn't live there anymore. She moved away a year ago to work as a carpenter in Rabelais."

"Hmm... didn't know that," LeFou said with mild interest. "But then again, I haven't really been following the going-ons in Villeneuve since I started working here." He tilted his head inquisitively. "You aren't thinking of making her your next  _conquest_ , are you?"

"Oh no!" Adam's face grew warm. "Nothing like that. I was just… curious."

"I see. Well then,  _Monsieur Curieux,_ do you still need some more time to brood? You know that I'm an expert at inventing cover stories if you want me to tell the Comte something to buy you time."

"No, that won't be necessary. Tell the Comte... I'll be down soon."

"If you say so." LeFou bowed. "Oh, and Master? I may not understand why you're feeling so self-deprecating today but take my advice. If you're really unhappy with yourself, then why not find a way to change? Take me, for example." He put his hands on his hips. "One day, I decided that I didn't want to spend the rest of my life working as a meagre barman in a town no one's ever heard of. If I was going to spend the rest of my life serving people, I wanted to at least serve them in style! So then I heard there was a position open for a maître d' at your castle, went to apply, and before I knew it, I got the job! So if I could find a way to make myself feel better by changing one thing about myself, I'm pretty sure you can too."

Adam looked back at the Enchantress's book, wishing he shared LeFou's optimism. So far, every "change" he'd made to his past had only made things worse. He'd convinced his past self to let the Enchantress into his castle, only to find himself clinging to the shadow of his dead mother and trapped in a betrothal to a princess he didn't love. He'd tried to change his childhood so that he'd never been raised by his abusive father, only to find out that he'd grown up just as careless and unthinking as he'd been before. To top it off, he was an unconvicted murderer, and Belle  _hated_ him for it. After all the terrible things he'd done in this reality, it was a huge mystery to him why the Enchantress hadn't cursed him yet. Perhaps she thought that being an irresponsible drunkard wasn't as bad as being an overtaxing tyrant obsessed with power and physical appearances. Or perhaps she'd never discovered him in this universe and gone off to find another unfortunate soul to curse. The Prince was no expert on time travel, but he was beginning to notice that every time he changed the past, he was changing several other lives in the process. Maybe it wasn't too much of a stretch to assume that the Enchantress could have been one of them.

Adam knew what he really wanted to do, of course. He wanted to get Belle out of that tavern and convince her that he wasn't the beast she thought he was. But how well would  _that_ turn out? It didn't matter if he shut down her workplace or dragged her out by force. If Belle already hated him, she would only see him as a captor, not an ally.

 _At least she has a roof over her head,_ he thought, trying to reassure himself. While he still shuddered to think of Belle's current line of work, maybe she would have a different opinion of him if he gave her some time to consider his job offer. At least, he  _hoped_ that was the right way of solving the problem. He didn't know what other alternatives he had.

* * *

The Comte de Crevoisier's meeting was a simple affair. The nobleman had come to ask the Prince to lend him some funds to remodel an estate they shared in Valnoir, which Adam did with little difficulty. Despite the impersonal, business-like nature of their meeting, it felt good to focus on something that didn't involve Belle or wondering how he was going to fix the universe for a change. Or maybe it just felt good to exercise some of the responsibilities he'd lost from being a beast for five years.

After the Comte's meeting, instead of taking the more direct path back to his room, Adam decided to detour past the servants' quarters—something he hadn't done since he was a young boy, looking to pass the time on the days his parents were too busy to pay attention to him.

Upon passing through the main corridor, Adam noticed that the door to the kitchen was hanging ajar, and Mrs. Potts was talking to someone inside.

"I'm not sure what he was on exactly, but from what Babette described, he was acting very strangely," she was saying. "He fell off the bed and looked at her like he'd never seen her before. Then he called her by a different name and asked about Lumière."

 _"È strano,"_ Maestro Cadenza replied with shared confusion. "That might explain why he was behaving out of sorts when he met with  _Duca_ Christophe this morning too. According to LeFou, he barely flinched during his uncle's lecture, and didn't even try to argue with him when he accused him of being immature and irresponsible."

Realizing that the servants were talking about him, Adam peered through the small opening in the door to listen more closely. Mrs. Potts, Cogsworth, and Maestro Cadenza were eating together at the wooden table at the center of the room, presumably on a shared lunch break.

"Perhaps he's coming down with the same sickness his father had," Cogsworth speculated. "It could well be that that particular brand of madness runs in the family."

"I have to respectfully disagree, Cogsworth," Mrs. Potts responded. "The Master has none of the symptoms his father had when he was ill. Besides, I don't think it's fair to diagnose someone based on the way they behaved in the course of one morning. Perhaps he's just had an epiphany."

Cogsworth snorted. "If that's true then about time! The Master's been in dire need of an epiphany for a good nine years if you ask me. The Sorbonne may have filled his head with books and knowledge, but it did nothing to develop that moral character of his."

"Or… perhaps he's just having an off-day," Cadenza suggested. "Everyone has those every now and again. Heaven knows how many times I've played a passage perfectly in practice, only to sound as incompetent as a tree stump on the day of the concert.  _Sfortunatamente,_ a musician's life is never easy. Why was Lumière fired anyway?" he added curiously. "Carlotta and I were on tour in Austria when it happened."

"He made a big fool of himself, that's why," Cogsworth replied, crossing his arms resentfully. "He was lucky enough to be fired for what he did. I was almost certain that he'd receive the death sentence."

"Cogsworth!" Mrs. Potts retorted. "You  _know_ you don't mean that. Lumière did a more noble thing for the Master than any of us combined, and that's the honest truth of the matter."

"And what exactly  _did_  he do?" Cadenza inquired.

Mrs. Potts sighed. "I suppose, to explain it fully I'd have to go back to the year the Master's mother passed away. You remember of course when the King organized that grand dinner party after the Queen's funeral and made the Master play the harpsichord for his guests?"

 _"Si."_ Cadenza nodded. "I must have spent hours teaching him how to play the Allegro from Handel's Suite in G minor for the occasion. But it was too soon for him to be performing after his mother's death. He just... wasn't ready. When he lost his confidence at the recital, his father was furious, and the boy was so ashamed of himself, he refused to touch a keyboard again."

"The King wasn't furious, he was  _livid,"_ Cogsworth corrected. "Lumière and I heard him lashing out on the boy after the party, and it was positively frightening. Which was why his behaviour the next day came as a huge puzzle to all of us. It was as though he'd had a great revelation, or someone had turned a switch in him."

"All we know is that after that night, the King was dreadfully frightened of his son, to the point that he refused to speak with him or be in the same room as him," Mrs. Potts elaborated. "Then, as though to distance himself further, he decided that he would postpone his son's tutoring, and send him off to be educated at the Sorbonne. Naturally, we were all surprised by his decision, but not as much as the Master was. The poor boy thought his father was sending him away to punish him! He'd write him letters every month, hoping for a chance at reconciliation, but the King never wrote back. He'd simply forward the letters to Lumière, saying he was too busy to read them, and he could reply in any manner he wanted."

"And did he?" Cadenza asked curiously.

"For a time," Cogsworth confirmed. "Lumière was very close with the Master, see. He considered it a great honour to support him as he transitioned to university life. But as the years passed, and Lumière realized that the King had no intention of writing a letter to his son, he did the unthinkable—against my good discretion, I may add. He confronted him. Called him a coward, said that he deserved to treat his son better. And for a man as proud and self-centered as the King, you can imagine how well  _that_  turned out." He shuddered. "He was so furious, he fired Lumière right on the spot."

"And not long after Lumière left the castle, the King became dreadfully ill," Mrs. Potts finished sadly. "Not even our best physicians could find a cure. He passed away when the Master was in his last year of university, and well… the rest is history."

"The poor Master." Cadenza shook his head. "Growing up with a father like that, it's no wonder he turned out to be so...  _autodistruttivo._  But what about Lumière? Was he able to find work after the King fired him?"

"Last we heard, he'd managed to secure a job in the Prince de Mailly-Nesle's household in Courbecour," Mrs. Potts confirmed. "He used to send us letters every month, though we haven't received anything from him in quite some time now."

Adam turned away from the door, a new feeling of guilt weighing on his shoulders. Now he understood why Lumière had stopped working at the castle. It was because of  _him._ The maître d' had tried to stand up for Adam, and his father, being the unfeeling arse that he was, had turned around and fired him in an instant.  _Oh, Lumière,_   _why didn't you bite your tongue?_ Adam lamented. It wasn't worth losing his job because of him. He knew he wouldn't have done it if he were in Lumière's shoes. But then he remembered the way Lumière had rushed to defend his thirteen-year-old self from his father's abuse to the point that Cogsworth had had to physically struggle to hold him back. After years of putting up with a tyrannical master and being powerless to stop it, perhaps it was only a matter of time before the former maître d' would snap and rebel.

The sound of a door opening at the far side of the corridor startled Adam from his musings. He turned to see Babette emerge from a storage closet with a feather duster in hand. His face grew warm again, still not over the embarrassing experience of seeing her naked a few hours earlier. At least she was in her uniform now, but he would prefer not to have another awkward encounter with her if he could avoid it.

Thankfully, there was a statue beside the kitchens that was just large enough for Adam to hide behind. He squeezed himself behind it, mere seconds before Babette strolled down the corridor, humming to herself as she dusted the candelabrum on the opposite side of the hall. As Adam waited for her to leave, he was struck by another revelation. Since Lumière had lost his job, he'd likely never known Babette as anything more than a colleague in this universe. The castle's virtuous "star-cross'd lovers" had never existed, all thanks to Adam's time meddling.

 _But it doesn't have to stay that way,_ he realized. LeFou had said that the best way for Adam to feel better about himself was to change something about his current lifestyle. He didn't know how to do that  _yet,_ but maybe he could do it for someone else. Two someones, if he was really lucky.

* * *

"Erm, Master?" said LeFou. "Remind me why you wanted to come here again?"

"To see an old friend," the Prince replied.

It had been three days since Adam had narrowly escaped his marriage to Princess Amandine and used the book to change the past again. In that time, he'd been trying his best to keep a low profile, avoiding anything that would cause his servants to raise further alarms about his "out-of-sorts behaviour." Which wasn't exactly easy to do, as Adam wasn't really sure  _how_  he was supposed to act in this universe. He had no energy to host a party, no interest in continuing his carnal relationship with Babette, and couldn't speak rudely to any of his servants without feeling guilty. In the end, he decided to spend the majority of his time holed up in the West Wing; something that was apparently normal for him to do this reality, despite all the socializing and whoring he took part in on a regular basis.

But today was different. Today, Adam was visiting Lumière's new household, to mend the bond his father had broken all those years ago. He just hoped that the former maître d' would be willing to accept his apology, given how long it had taken Adam to discover his real reasons for leaving the castle.

The Prince de Mailly-Nesle's castle resided on the outskirts of the city of Courbecour. It was a modestly sized estate made of white brick; its exterior a mixture of late Gothic and early Renaissance architecture. Once they arrived at the front steps, Adam stepped out of the carriage with LeFou and knocked on the castle's main entrance. A man donned in a powdered wig and brightly coloured suit reserved for domestic servants promptly answered them.

"Oh, good afternoon, Your Highness," the servant said, stooping himself down into a quick bow. "I regret to inform you that my master is away in Luxembourg until the fourteenth. If you wish to leave him a message—"

"That's quite alright, Monsieur," Adam replied. "I'm actually here to speak with one of your staff members. His name is Jean-Eugène Lumière."

The doorman raised an eyebrow in confusion. "Lumière was fired months ago for failing to perform his work duties," he replied. "Is this an urgent manner?"

"I'm afraid so," Adam responded, taken aback by this bit of unexpected news. "Do you know where I can find him?"

"Regrettably, no. But we may still have his home address written in our record books if you would like me to retrieve them for you."

"I would greatly appreciate that."

The doorman nodded and escorted the Prince and LeFou into the castle's sitting room while he went to pull up Lumière's information. Fifteen minutes later, he returned with a slip of paper bearing directions to Lumière's home address. According to their record books, Lumière lived in an apartment in Courbecour and was a mere fifteen-minute walk from the castle. Adam thanked the doorman for his time and returned to the carriage with LeFou, determined to reunite with his former maître d' once more.

Unfortunately, the apartment address only brought the Prince to another dead end.

"We kicked him out months ago," the landlord said, after Adam had inquired about whether he had ever rented a room out to a man named Jean-Eugène Lumière. "He stopped paying his lease and made a complete mess out of his apartment. It must have taken us weeks to get rid of the smell,  _mon dieu."_

"And I don't suppose you know where he went after you evicted him?" Adam asked in desperation.

"Afraid not."

The Prince left the apartment with his shoulders slouched and his fists clenched. He felt discouraged and frustrated by his lack of progress. All he'd learned from the doorman and the landlord was that Lumière had neglected to take care of his apartment, pay his rent and fulfill his work duties—qualities that didn't sound like Lumière at all. And worst of all, Adam still had no idea where to find him.

"Why don't you try a tavern?" LeFou suggested in an attempt to support his visibly disheartened master. "Bartenders are pretty good at remembering names and faces."

Adam was about to ask LeFou where they could find a good tavern in the city when he became distracted by the sound of a man singing a raspy, off-key folk song on the side of the street. His dissonant-sounding voice was accompanied by a tinny-sounding string instrument, which also seemed to be in dire need of a tune up. Adam turned his head towards the noise, feeling a strong urge to make a comment about how someone with such awful musicianship skills shouldn't be allowed to perform in public, then stopped himself.

The man playing the atrocious music had to be somewhere in his mid to late thirties. He sat on the curb with his legs crossed, a battered-looking guitar in his lap, some bottles of ale on his left and a tricorn hat containing a few coins in front of him. He wore a brown, threadbare waistcoat, cotton shirt, and britches, all of which were in dire need of washing and mending. His dishwater blonde hair was long and disheveled, and he was sporting a shaggy beard, which Adam assumed was common to men who lived on the street with no access to razor blades.

But the one aspect of the man's appearance that really caught Adam's attention was his face. For as he turned his head, Adam caught sight of a droopy nose and blue eyes that were strikingly familiar…

"Hey, Master!" LeFou shouted. "Wait for me!"

Adam strode towards the beggar, who immediately ceased his singing upon seeing the important-looking nobleman standing in front of him.

"Well good afternoon,  _Seigneur,"_ he said jovially, a noticeable slur in his voice. "Spare some coin for a poor soul like me?"

"Lumière," Adam replied incredulously.  _"It's me."_

Lumière squinted his bloodshot eyes in suspicion. Then his mouth dropped open with realization. "M-Master Adam? I-Is it really you?" His voice grew thick with emotion. "Why, you've grown so tall and handsome! What brings you to see me?"

"I've come… to take you home, of course," Adam responded awkwardly.

"H-Home?" Lumière repeated with a hiccup. "But Courbecour is my home now. Besides... the King, he fired me."

"Well then, I am officially unfiring you," Adam declared. "Lumière, you stood up to my father when no one else would. You were the only one who bothered to write to me when I was away in university. I can't let you live on the streets like this; wearing rags, begging for money, playing this… music."

"And what's wrong with my music, eh?" said Lumière, demeanour quickly changing as he tightened his grip on his guitar. "I'll have you know that if not for poor entertainers like me, rich people like you wouldn't exist! Besides, it's not all that bad, being homeless. I sing when I want, I sleep when I want, I drink when I want, I piss wherever I want. I'd much rather live outdoors and be my own man than work as a—"

Lumière's sentence was abruptly cut off, as he proceeded to vomit some bright yellow bile on to the pavement. Adam and LeFou stepped backwards in disgust.

"Master, are you really sure you want to take this guy back to the castle?" LeFou asked hesitantly.

"Absolutely," Adam replied. "Now help me lift him up."

Lumière tried to keep the Prince and LeFou back with a few feeble swings of his guitar but was too sick and inebriated to do any real damage. In the end, he weakly allowed the two men to carry him back to the carriage, muttering incomprehensible curses and protests the entire way.

* * *

By the time Adam and LeFou had returned to the castle, Lumière had thrown up at least three more times. The Prince was quite certain that the carriage's carpet and upholstery would have to be replaced, but all of that was inconsequential in the grander scheme of things. As long as he had Lumière with him, he would be one step closer to fixing this disaster of a universe he'd created. That was really all that mattered.

While LeFou went to find the castle physician, Adam led the semi-conscious Lumière out of the carriage and into the atrium, ignoring the shocked stares and gasps from his servants as he did. He guided Lumière into the closest bedchamber and anxiously waited for the doctor to arrive.

"It appears that the gentleman's sickness is a result of his excessive drinking," the physician declared fifteen minutes later, upon performing a physical examination on the former maître d'. "His temperature is also quite warm. I suspect he's acquired a fever from prolonged exposure to the elements. For now, I'd suggest we give him some fluids and let him sleep off his drink."

There was a knock on the door. Adam looked up to see Babette standing in the threshold with an uneasy expression on her face, as though she wasn't entirely sure what she was doing there.

"You wanted to see me, Master?" she said, addressing the Prince with a curtsey.

"Yes, Plu-I mean, Babette," Adam replied, beckoning her into the room. "I'd like you to meet Jean-Eugène Lumière, my old maître d'."

Babette looked down at the haggard man passed out on the bed and raised her eyebrows in pity and concern. "He looks dreadful," she noted. "What happened to him?"

"It seems that he had a bit too much to drink," Adam replied. "I found him muttering nonsense and begging for money while I was travelling through Courbecour with LeFou. He had nowhere to stay, so I brought him back here." He looked back at Babette. "Would you mind looking after him for me while he recovers?"

"Well... I suppose," she replied, fidgeting with her hands nervously. "But I'm a bit confused. Wouldn't you want someone with more medical expertise to look after him, like Angélique or Véronique?"

"No, no. I'm sure you'll do just fine." He had no idea who Angélique and Véronique were anyway.

"Well then." She bit her lip. "I would never deny a request from His Royal Highness."

"Merci, Babette. And um, one more thing." He stepped closer to her, in the case the doctor overheard him. "This relationship we have. Do you...  _enjoy_  it?"

Babette tilted her head in uncertainty. "You've lost me, Master."

"Do you  _like_... being with me?" he elaborated. "Or do you only sleep with me because I ask you to?"

"Oh." Her face turned slightly red. "Well, I'm not sure if it's really my place to answer that question, Your Highness. After all, I'm only a servant girl."

"Right. And that's part of the problem isn't it?" Adam rubbed the back of his head awkwardly. "Babette, I've decided that... I no longer wish to employ you as my courtesan. It's nothing personal... it's just—I can't see myself continuing this relationship with you if— _when_  I initiated it out of force. Your wages won't change," he added reassuringly. "You'll still be given the same pay, and you'll still be responsible for all your other household duties. You may even engage in relationships with other men in my household, if you so desire. But I will no longer ask you to spend the night with me, and if I do, you have every right to refuse. Do you understand?"

Babette widened her eyes, looking startled but relieved at the same time. "Of course, Master. If that is your wish, then I shall gladly honour it."

"Excellent. I will leave you to your task then."

She curtsied again and drew a chair up next to the bed, beginning her reluctant watch over the poor, drunken maître d'. Adam wondered if she had any idea that her life and Lumière's were about to change for the better.


	8. Chapter 8

_Dear Mlle Belle Gagnier,_

_First of all, I wish to apologize for my uncalled-for visit to your workplace last week. My intention was to offer you a job at my castle, one that I believed would be of interest to you, based on stories I'd heard from your former townsfolk in Villeneuve. I now realize that I should have been more tactful in speaking with you, as I did not realize that you were still grieving for the loss of your father. Nor did I realize that I was directly responsible for his death through my own reckless behaviour._

_I hope you can find it in your heart to forgive me, as I truly believe that your sharp wit and intellect would be a valuable asset to my castle staff. Furthermore, I think that you and I could…_

Adam furiously scrunched up the letter and tossed it into the fireplace to burn with the others.  _Oh, what's the use of trying?_  he thought, slouching in his chair despondently. He'd been going at it for an hour, and every letter he'd written to Belle only sounded worse and worse. She probably wouldn't even bother reading whatever apology note he sent her; only roll her eyes disdainfully before ripping it to shreds. It was time to face the music: there was nothing he could do—no way of convincing Belle of his sincerity in asking her to work for him, just as there was no way for him to go back in time and prevent Maurice's death. He'd reached yet another stalemate in his time travelling ventures, and this time could think of no way of fixing it.

A knock on the bureau door startled the Prince from his thoughts. It was Chapeau, standing in the open doorway with a nervous expression on his face. "Bonjour Master. I'm sorry for interrupting, but Duke Vincent is here to see you. He's waiting for you in the drawing room."

"Duke… Vincent?" Adam repeated slowly.

"Yes, Master. Duke Vincent de Breil de Pontbriand. Your  _cousin?"_ Chapeau emphasized, seemingly accustomed to his master's sporadic lapses in memory by now.

"Oh,  _that_  Vincent," Adam replied. "Right! Well then, I'll be straight down."

Of course, the Prince would never admit that he actually knew very little about his cousin in this universe. He hadn't seen him since his mother's funeral; no thanks to his heartless father, who'd deliberately cut his son off from anything or anyone that would distract him from becoming his vision of a perfect prince. All Adam knew about the Vincent in this universe was that he'd gone to university with him and that they'd visited each other's castles several times in the past few years. Vincent also seemed to have a reputation for being a notorious troublemaker, based on what Adam had learned about him from LeFou and the Enchantress's book. Knowing this latter detail, he wasn't sure if he was going to enjoy this encounter with him or not.

It was a strange experience for Adam to see Vincent ten minutes later, sitting in the drawing room in a dark blue dinner jacket and breeches. He was no longer the gangly, freckled-face boy Adam remembered from childhood, but a grown man of twenty-five years of age, with broad shoulders, long brown hair and grey-blue eyes. Adam verbally greeted his cousin before he sat across from him, so they could speak face-to-face.

"I hope you don't mind if I camp out here for a little," Vincent began, helping himself to a plate of custard tarts the servants had left for them on the table. "Père and I had another row yesterday. You know how it is. He said that I'm tarnishing the family name, embarrassing him with my excessive drinking and gambling habits." He rolled his eyes and made a face. "As if he was any better when he was my age! He just won't admit it. Anyways, to add more salt to the wound, he's now asking me to go with him to the Emperor's birthday party next month to pick out a potential bride. He thinks it will 'mature' me up somehow, having a wife to look after who can continue the family legacy." He sneered. "If he thinks that a marriage is going to change anything, he's even more of a fool than I thought."

"Well… do you at least have someone special in mind?" Adam asked, unsure of whether he was supposed to sympathize with his cousin's situation or support his search for an "eligible fiancée."

The Duke laughed. "Of course not. I've already been to all the parties in Paris, coz. I know who's available, and quite frankly, there's no one there that interests me. Take the Comtesse de Bruc for example. Her complexion is fair enough, but her eyes are far too bright. The Vicomtesse de Nompère de Champagny has no curves to speak of. And the Baroness de Vassal de La Barde has enough pimples on her face to look like her skin is made of porridge, especially when she tries to cover it up with all that powder. It's positively ghastly."

 _Still, I bet that courting someone with a face that looks like breakfast is easier than courting a beast,_ Adam wanted to say. But he kept his thoughts to himself. After all, he was no saint when it came to judging women for their outward appearances. In fact, if it wasn't for the Enchantress, he would probably  _still_ see them the way his cousin did; superficial objects whose sole purpose was to make men happy. He had a horrible feeling that the Adam of this universe continued to think of women that way, based on the way his cousin was speaking to him right now.

"Maybe if you engaged one in conversation, you'd have more to judge her on than just her physical appearance," he suggested, unsure of what else to say.

"Oh, coz. We'd all like to think that, wouldn't we?" The Duke smirked. "The truth of the matter is that the ladies of court have nothing of value to talk about. Believe me, I know. Père's made me dance with one every year, and the subject of their conversations is always the same: either a boring joke, a scripted social remark, empty compliments, something about the weather, the food, the music, the ballroom. It's terribly dull. Dull enough to make a man drink himself senseless all night; not that you haven't done  _that_ before."

He flashed the Prince a knowing smile, to which Adam bowed his head self-consciously. "Well then, what  _should_  a woman talk about?" he asked.

"Oh, I don't know. How about...  _anything?"_ his cousin replied exasperatingly. "Their likes, their dislikes, their interests! Something that drives them crazy. Something that they can build a  _real_ conversation from. Something that will make them stand out in my mind as more than a painted face in a gigantic dress." He paused, lips suddenly lowering into a frown. "But what are the chances of finding a girl like that, eh? We both know that today's noblewomen are far too demure and fragile to  _ever_ dare to speak their minds. I'd be better off letting Père choose an empty-headed bride for me and taking a mistress or two on the side. Speaking of which, is Babette—?"

"—no," Adam cut in, eager to shut down whatever his cousin was trying to say on the subject of his ex-courtesan.

Vincent tilted his head inquisitively. "Oho, keeping her for yourself now, are you? Is this  _l'amour_ I'm sensing?"

"No, no. It's not that." He shook his head in embarrassment. "I've... given Babette a special job to do. She's busy nursing a former servant of mine."

"Oh. Well that's a pity," Vincent replied disappointingly. "I was looking forward to having some fun with her while I was here. But no matter." He shrugged. "I suppose I'll settle for taking my horse out for a ride in the woods instead. Or... we could see that opera performing in Lorraine on Saturday. It's called  _Alceste._ Have you heard of it?"

"You know I don't like the opera, Vincent," Adam replied in disinterest.

"I know." His cousin grinned. "But that doesn't mean I won't stop persuading you to go."

They sat in silence for a minute, Vincent helping himself to some more custard tarts while Adam let his mind wander. His conversation with his cousin had reminded him of something Belle had said to him in the tavern:  _"As we were passing through the woods near your castle, one of our trunks fell out of the wagon. My father walked onto the road to retrieve it. And who should have shown up but you. You and that... ruddy cousin of yours, Duke something-or-other. You were both riding your horses at breakneck speeds, right into my father's path."_

"Vincent," Adam said aloud, "refresh my memory for me. Did we ever do any horse racing when you visited me last summer?"

"Did we ever!" Vincent confirmed. "You're quite a show off on that Arabian horse, you are. Why? You're not thinking of going again, are you? Because I can assure you that I've got a lot of practice in since then."

"Not... exactly," Adam replied. "Vincent, when we went racing… was there ever a moment where we saw an old man in the woods with curly hair and glasses? And did I ever… run into him with my horse?"

 _"Certainement."_ Vincent nodded. "We got a good laugh out of it too. I mean, what kind of fool stumbles onto the road, right into the oncoming path of two noblemen on horses? He had to have either been blind or daft to pull off a silly stunt like that."

Adam clenched his hands into fists, angered and disgusted by the casual manner of his cousin's words. "I found out last week that he  _died_  because of me," he confessed. "And... he left a daughter behind."

Vincent stared at his cousin in shock. Then, he laughed. "Goodness coz, is  _this_  why you're acting so serious? So what if you killed an old man? You're a prince—it's not like the authorities can arrest you for murder! Besides, it was  _his_ fault for being on the road when he wasn't supposed to be. He was already asking for a death wish! And maybe you killing him was better for him in the long run. You might have stopped him from suffering from a slow, painful death."

He gave him a chilling smile, one that did little to lift Adam's spirits. This was Belle's father Vincent was talking about, after all. Maurice may have made a mistake, but he was also a good man and a talented artist, one who'd spent years protecting his daughter from the harsh realities of the world. He didn't deserve to die the way he did.  _But why would I care?_ Adam realized. Like Belle had said, all he was in this universe was a spoiled and selfish beast. And a spoiled and selfish beast would think of Maurice as nothing more than a disposable item. He never thought he could hate himself any more until that moment.

Luckily, Vincent soon changed the subject, sharing a story about his sister Léa and his recent visit to his new brother-in-law's estate in Vertemuraille. While it was interesting to hear that Léa was married now, Maurice's death continued to weigh on Adam's mind for the rest of their conversation.

* * *

Later that day, Adam went to visit Lumière in his temporary bedchamber in the East Wing. He was relieved to see that he was awake now and that the sickly pallor from his face was gone, replaced by a healthy flush to his cheeks. Adam greeted him warmly before taking a seat next to his bed.

"How are you feeling?" he asked.

"Much better, thank you," Lumière replied with a smile. "I haven't felt this well-rested, since… well, I can't remember to be honest."

"I'm glad to hear. I presume that Babette has done a good job taking care of you?"

"Oh, she is a perfect  _ange,_  Master," Lumière agreed fondly. "I've must have thrown up almost a dozen times by now, and she's never complained once. She carries herself with such poise and grace, like... a swan about to take flight against a stormy wind. I've never seen that much beauty and conviction in a woman before."

"Why, Lumière," Adam said, cocking his head in feigned surprise. "If I didn't know better, I'd think that you're starting to have feelings for my maid. Is that true?"

A dull blush crept onto Lumière's face. "O-Of course not!" he insisted. "I simply think that she is… an admirable nurse is all." He lowered his head and sighed. "Fine. You've caught me. But what does it matter? A pretty jewel like her could do far better than a disappointment like me."

"Oh, you mustn't give up hope, old friend," the Prince said encouragingly. "For all we know, she could already be interested in you."

Lumière perked up his head hopefully. "You really think so?"

"Well, not for certain, no. But surely it wouldn't hurt to talk to her and find out?"

"You're right." He nodded. "My name isn't Jean-Eugène Lumière for nothing after all! I charmed plenty of women in my younger years. I'm sure I still have some of that old 'spark' in me." He placed his hands over his chest, face alight with newfound confidence. "Yes. Once I've regained my strength, I will show Mademoiselle Babette who I  _truly_  am. I will find out what it will take to win her affections or die trying!"

The Prince chuckled. "Now you're starting to sound like your old self."

 _"Grâce à vous, Maître._ Oh, and by the way, I want to apologize for whatever I said to you back in Courbecour. I didn't mean any of it, really. After all that ale I drank, I just... wasn't myself."

"I understand," Adam replied in sympathy. "Believe me, I know a thing or two about what it's like to be on the wrong end of the bottle. But what happened to you exactly? I tried to find you at the Prince de Mailly-Nesle's household, and all they said was that you'd been fired for failing to perform your work duties."

Lumière lowered his eyes. "I'm afraid it's true," he admitted shamefully. "But you must understand, Master. I wasn't in a good place there, not for a long time. Just imagine it: I'd spent  _years_ serving your family's household, building a home, community, and title for myself. Then, with one word from your father, I lost everything. I had to pack my things, find a new job, start all over again. And the new workplace that hired me was nothing like the one I left behind."

"The Prince de Mailly-Nesle wasn't a  _terrible_ employer," he went on, "but there was no room for me to be myself in his household. His majordomo must have changed my job position so many times, I eventually stopped caring. There were a lot of foolish things I did in my last few months of employment there that I regret doing now." His eyes looked off into space for a moment, haunted by old memories. Adam hated to see him look that way.

"Well… I'm glad found you when I did," he said in an effort to cheer him up. "I— _We_  could really use you here."

Lumière focused his gaze back on the Master and smiled. "Thank you, my Prince. Rest assured, I am more than willing to serve you again if you'll have me. Call me an old sap, but this place has been more of a home to me than any other place I've lived in or worked in before. If you didn't bring me back here, I fear I may have lost my wits completely." He stopped for a moment to wipe some emotion-driven tears from his eyes. When he finished, he changed the subject saying, "Master... forgive my curiosity, but I've been hearing rumours from the others—well,  _whispers_  really that you haven't been acting yourself lately."

Adam raised an eyebrow, pretending to look shocked. "Really?"

 _"Oui._  They say that you seem  _unsettled_  about something, but they don't know what. I would never pry into your personal affairs without your permission of course, but is there anything I can do to help?"

Adam reluctantly crossed his arms. While he could easily evade Lumière's question if he wanted to, he felt that he could trust him with the truth; more than he could with LeFou and the servants anyway. Lately, they'd all been treating him like an explosive, set to go off at any minute. He didn't like it one bit. "It's difficult to explain, Lumière," he began. "Recently, I learned that I… wronged someone in one of the worst ways possible. I've apologized and compensated them for what I did, but they still won't forgive me. I don't know what else I can do to make things right."

"Ah, if only we could all forgive and forget as easily as the saints do," Lumière said in warm understanding. "But I suppose it's only human nature for some to hold on to grudges longer than others. Take Cogsworth, for example. He  _still_ hasn't forgiven me for staining red wine on the dining room carpet, and that happened over  _ten_  years ago!" He rolled his eyes in annoyance. "All I can say is that if you've already apologized to this person and given them compensation for it, then there's nothing more you can do, except forgive yourself and move on."

"But what if I can't?" asked Adam. He'd changed time so he could have a fresh start with Belle. He couldn't sit here now, knowing that door had already shut before he'd had a chance to see what was on the other side.

"You are my Prince, Master. I  _know_ you can," Lumière said reassuringly. "Oh… you've always been so down on yourself, even when you were a little boy. Do you remember when your father took you out into the woods to shoot your first buck? It couldn't have been a cleaner shot, but you were too scared to pull the trigger. You returned to the castle in tears, and your father was furious."

"My memory isn't  _that_ terrible, Lumière," Adam said pointedly. "Also… it was a  _doe,_ not a buck."

"My mistake." He shrugged his shoulders. "So then, do you remember what your mother said to you after?"

The Prince rested his chin on his hand, thinking. "She said… not to be discouraged," he recalled. "And that maybe I wasn't meant to be a hunter, but I would find my own special talent one day. And when I did, it would make the kingdom a better place."

"Exactly." Lumière smiled. "You still have that potential, Master. I believe in it, and I know the others do too."

* * *

"It's not that I  _disagree_  with you, Mr. Potts," Adam overheard Cogsworth saying as he was passing through the atrium later that day. "But you  _know_ how the Master feels about having uninvited guests at his castle. Lumière is one thing, but he hasn't even  _met_  this girl before! We have to think of a way to  _ease_ him into the situation, or else he might—"

The majordomo immediately cut himself off as the Prince turned the corner. His eyes grew wide with alarm. "Ahem. Good afternoon, Your Highness," he said in a fast and high-sounding voice. "I must say... you're looking exceptionally dapper today."

He flimsily tried to shield the Prince from the display behind him, but it was no use—Adam had already seen everything. Mr. Potts stood in the foyer with a cluster of servants, most likely bystanders to the conversation that had occurred between him and Cogsworth a few moments ago. In Mr. Potts's arms was what Adam first assumed to be a pile of large, dirty rags, but upon closer inspection, realized was an actual person. And not just  _any_ person. It was a very sickly and malnourished Belle. She lifted her head a fraction and smiled at the Prince in weak recognition. "Hello, Your Highness," she said, her voice as raspy as dry leaves. "It's not too late to accept your job offer... is it?"

Adam's heart skipped a beat. It felt as though Belle had become the center of the universe, and all he could do was gape at her, unable to believe that she was here, and appalled at how quickly her health had deteriorated in the short time that had passed since he'd seen her in the tavern. "Take her to one of my guest rooms," he said aloud, "and find the physician."

"Right away, Master!" Mr. Potts affirmed. He adjusted his hold on Belle and gave her a reassuring smile. "Come now, Belle. We're going to get you some help."

They were out of the Prince's sight in an instant, accompanied by a reluctant Cogsworth and an entourage of worried servants, eager to do whatever they could to help the poor newcomer.

* * *

It had to be one of the longest waits of Adam's life. He stood anxiously outside of Belle's temporary bedchamber as the castle physician and a handful of female servants tended to her inside. His only company was Mr. Potts, LeFou, and Cogsworth, who waited attentively by the bedchamber doors. Whether this was out of concern for their Master or concern for Belle, Adam couldn't tell.

"Master, I'm sorry for bringing the girl into the castle without your permission," Mr. Potts rambled, removing his hat and twisting it in his hands nervously. "It's just… she had nowhere else to go. Her name is Belle Gagnier, and she used to live in my village. I went to Rabelais this morning to pick up a shipment for the castle when I saw her wandering the streets, begging for money and coughing something dreadful. She said she'd been fired from her job at the local tavern for not satisfying enough customers or summat." He slouched his shoulders sadly. "It broke my heart to see her in such a state. I knew I couldn't leave her that way. So I took her to the only place I could think of where she'd be safe."

"You did the right thing, Mr. Potts," the Prince said encouragingly.  _In fact, I ought to thank you for finding her, or else I may have never got another chance to make amends with her._

The doors to Belle's room opened. Out came the physician, M. Pomme, with a tired and defeated look on his face.

"How is she?" Adam asked him in worry.

"Not good, Master," M. Pomme replied. "The girl appears to be suffering from an advanced stage of consumption. It's a miracle she's managed to last this long without seeing a doctor. All I can suggest is that we let her rest while I read up on some possible remedies."

Adam bit his lip. If Belle had consumption, then she was even sicker than he thought. He knew how serious that condition could be, having seen it take his mother's life all those years ago. "You have my permission to provide her with her whatever she needs to be comfortable," he told the doctor, vowing not to lose Belle the same way he'd lost Henriette. "If there are any medicines she needs, I'll cover all the expenses for them."

"Master, forgive my intrusiveness, but are you really suggesting that you would spend your resources on a common girl you've never met before?" Cogsworth asked, tilting his head in confusion.

"I'm… trying to be a Good Samaritan," he explained lamely. "Besides, it sounds like she's been through quite a lot already."

* * *

He would have gladly waited outside Belle's bedchambers until she was well enough to see him, but royal duties took priority. He spent the rest of the day reading and signing some papers in his study, before having dinner with Vincent and joining him in a game of chess.

It wasn't until the next morning that M. Pomme deemed that Belle was well enough to see visitors. Adam made his way to her room without a second thought, stopping momentarily at the doorway to watch her sleep.

She looked so fragile and tiny, even from a human's perspective. Her hair, which she'd always braided or pinned behind her head, now lay loose and lifelessly around her shoulders. There were dark circles under her eyes, and her skin was as pale as the white pillows she was sleeping against. Whatever fullness she used to have in her face was gone; replaced by sunken eyes and hollow cheekbones. Adam almost didn't want to believe that this was the same Belle he'd danced with so long ago, but it was.

Belle slowly stirred and opened her dark brown eyes. "Your Highness?" she said hoarsely. The old hatred in her voice was gone, replaced by a tone of mild curiosity.

"Uh, good morning Mademoiselle Gagnier," Adam responded, forcing himself back into the present. "I hope that everything is to your liking."

"Well of course it is," she replied, furrowing her brows, as though she found something perplexing about his comment. "Thank you for letting me stay at your castle. I've never slept in a more beautiful room before. I reckon that it's even larger than my old house in Villeneuve."

The Prince forced himself not to laugh. He didn't have the heart to tell Belle that his own bedchamber was twice the size of this one and that he could easily move her into a larger room if she wanted. "I... wanted to apologize again," he said, moving closer to the bed, "for what I did to your father. I truly never meant for it to happen. In fact, I've been regretting it every day since you told me."

"What's done is done, Your Highness," Belle replied, her voice full of unexpected warmth and compassion. "I forgive you now."

He tilted his head, unsure if he'd heard her correctly. "You… do?"

"Well, there's nothing for it, really," she admitted. "At my last confession in Rabelais, the priest told me that I have to let go of personal grudges I have against people. Under the circumstances… I suppose it's only right that I start with you."

"You still went to church," the Prince noted with surprise.

"Just because I was a prostitute doesn't mean I stopped believing," she explained. "My life at the tavern was just another job, one I had to do to survive." She suddenly let out a shuddering cough, one that shook her body to the core and drained whatever colour was left on her youthful face. She quickly grabbed the handkerchief next to her pillow and placed it to her mouth to muffle the sound.

When the coughing subsided, Belle withdrew the cloth. It was now covered in fresh blood stains, much to Adam's horror.

"Oh, your servants have been so kind to me," she continued, tossing the bloody handkerchief aside as though it were nothing. "They gave me all these wonderful books to read, but I'm not sure I have enough strength to keep my eyes open for longer than a few minutes at a time." She gestured to a pile of fiction books on the bedside table, which the servants had brought from the library as per their master's request.

"I could read something to you if you wish," Adam offered.

"You could?" She quirked an eyebrow. "But you're a prince. Don't you have more important things to do?"

"I do. But not for another hour at least." Technically, he wasn't lying. He had promised to go horseback riding with Vincent after lunch, though he'd much prefer to stay here and talk with Belle. He hadn't had a conversation with her in ages and hadn't realized how much he missed sharing these quiet moments with her until now.

"Well,"—she bit her lip pensively—"if it's not too much trouble."

"Not at all." He moved to the bedside table to look at the selections. "What shall I read to you? Something with a bit of romance maybe? Heartache? Pining?" He smirked at his own joke.

Belle coughed again. "Anything is fine with me, Your Highness."

In the end, he chose the book on the top of the pile: an illustrated collection of fairy tales by Charles Perrault. He took a seat next to Belle's bed and turned to the first page, which contained a drawing of Cinderella in rags with a broomstick in hand. He looked up at Belle, who was waiting patiently for him to start reading. Except this wasn't story he wanted to tell her. Not now, anyway.

So instead, he told her a new story. One about a beauty and a beast.

He had to change a few details, of course. Belle's name was now Judith, and instead of living with her father, she lived with her father, five sisters and six brothers in a derelict part of the French countryside. Her father wasn't an artist, but a merchant, who'd been forced into poverty after losing all his wealth at sea. He'd met the nameless Beast at his enchanted castle, while en route to pick up a surviving shipment at a distant city.

After that, the tale very much aligned with the one the Prince had lived through in the original timeline. He recounted how Judith had boldly taken her father's place as the Beast's prisoner, and how she and the Beast had initially regarded each other with disdain, which changed to mutual respect after they'd saved each other from a pack of wolves in the forest. Not long after, they discovered their common interest in literature, and spent hours in the Beast's library, sorting through old books and reading passages aloud to one another. It was at this point the Beast began to develop feelings for the unconventional, yet beautiful peasant girl who'd traded her freedom for her father's. He began to find excuses to spend more time with her, joining her for meals and accompanying her on long walks in the castle grounds. He even organized a private dance for the two of them, one that he hoped would end with them confessing their love, so he could break the spell that had held him and his servants captive for so many years.

But the moment never came. After the dance, Judith admitted how terribly she missed her father, and out of pity, the Beast allowed her to use his magic mirror to see him. The mirror showed them a sick, dying old man calling out for his beloved daughter. It broke Judith's heart to see her father in such a state, just as it broke the Beast's heart to see Judith in so much pain. And so, he made one of the most difficult decisions of his life. He let her return to her father with no strings attached. She was his prisoner no longer.

By the time he'd reached the end of the story, Belle had fallen asleep again. Adam softly closed the book, wiping a stubborn tear from his eye as he returned it to the table. He'd never known that recalling the past could take such an emotional toll on him. Just as he'd never known that giving up Belle could leave him so heartbroken and empty. He was so absorbed in his thoughts, that he nearly jumped as he heard Belle cough and speak again.

"Wait. That's all?"

He turned back to her with a start. "What?"

"The Beast let Judith go back to her father, and that's it?"

"Well… of course. That's how the story ends."

Belle narrowed her eyes in befuddlement. "But what about the spell? I thought the Beast needed to earn Judith's love to become a prince again."

"He did," he confirmed. "But in the end, he decided that it didn't matter anymore. It was never really about becoming human again, you see. It was about learning to let go. All his life, the Beast had thought only of himself. When he was a human, he cared only about outward appearances, collecting beautiful things and spending his company with the most beautiful people. Even when he was a Beast, he continued to run his household with the same self-entitlement he had as a prince. But that night was the first night he realized that someone's needs were more important than his own. He let Judith go, understanding that even though he'd never have that chance to be human again, she'd be happy and free. That was his real transformation."

Belle pursed her lips, thinking. "I still think she would have come back."

"Really?" He looked at her in surprise.

"Well, not  _immediately,_ but after a certain amount of time, yes. The Beast  _was_ kind to her, and they seemed to have a lot in common once they got over their initial differences. Maybe she just needed some time away from the castle to sort out her feelings. I mean, she went to the castle to find her father first of all. I doubt she expected to fall in love with his captor, much less a talking beast. Maybe in time, she'd realize that she  _did_ feel something for him and go back to..." Her voice trailed off, and her expression suddenly grew sad. "Oh, what am I saying? I'm no love expert. I've never even been in love before. And now I never will be."

There was an extra measure of remorse in her last sentence that pulled at Adam's heartstrings in a way he didn't know possible. He felt a strong urge to take her hand and comfort her but realized how inappropriate that would be and stopped himself. "There's still time for you, Mademoiselle," he said instead.

"No." She coughed again. "I don't think there is. I've heard Monsieur Pomme talking about me and how far my infection has spread. It will be a miracle if I last the week."

"You're… not afraid?"

"To die?" She snorted. "Everyone dies at some point, Your Highness. It won't be that bad. At least I'll see my Papa again. And my Maman. I never knew who she was, you know. She died when I was just a baby. My Papa used to paint all these portraits of her and tell me all these wonderful stories about her, but the one story he refused to tell me was how she died. When I'm in heaven, maybe I'll finally learn the truth."

 _But you_ did _know, Belle,_ Adam wanted to say. _Your mother died of the plague back in Paris. We travelled back to your old home together and saw everything: your cradle, your baby rattle, the doctor's mask. You were so upset, and you asked me to bring you home..._ But once again, he realized how inappropriate that would be, and kept his mouth shut.

"Maybe this is God's way of punishing me," Belle went on. "Maybe I should have accepted Gaston's marriage proposal when I still had the chance."

"I have to respectfully disagree, Mademoiselle," Adam countered. "I've met this Gaston fellow before, and he's quite the brute. He has no sense of personal boundaries and has an ego big enough to rival that of Narcissus." He grimaced. "There are so many better suitors to choose from."

Belle stared at him intriguingly. "Did you just reference a character from Greek mythology, Your Highness?"

"Well, I did have an expensive education."

Suddenly, there was a knock on the door. It came from Père Robert, who was peering through the doorway with a bible in hand. "Oh, good morning, Your Highness," he said with a bow. "Forgive my interruption, but I'm here to deliver Belle's last rites and confession."

The Prince raised his brows in confusion. "Why are you doing that? She's not  _dying."_

"It never hurts to be cautious, Your Highness," the chaplain replied with a sad smile.

Adam reluctantly saw his point. He knew that it wasn't right to deny Belle her personal time with the Lord, even if he'd rather spend that time with her instead. "Very well." He turned back to Belle. "It was nice talking with you, Mademoiselle Gagnier."

"Likewise, Your Highness." She smiled. "Thank you for the nice story. I've actually never heard of that one before. Did you say what it was called?"

"I didn't. It's called, um…  _Beauty and the Beast."_

He stood up and left the room to give Belle and Père Robert their privacy.

* * *

Adam spent the afternoon racing his horse through the forest with Vincent, letting him win a couple of times to make him happy. Along the way, they passed by the old game trail Adam had taken with his father fifteen years ago to shoot his first deer. It was such a peculiar memory for Lumière to bring up, and Adam couldn't help but wonder how he still remembered it after all these years.

There was one major piece of the story that the old maître d' was missing of course, and it was a part that Adam had never disclosed to anyone before. The truth was, he hadn't been scared to shoot that doe because of  _the way_ it looked at him, but because of  _what_ it looked like.

 _The doe had shimmering golden eyes. The more the Prince stared at it, the more he sensed that there was something powerful and mystical about it, and that something_  bad  _would happen if he tried to kill it. He turned to his father to voice his fears, but the King curtly dismissed him. He said that he was making excuses and to "shoot the damn thing already." In his eyes, there was nothing wrong with the animal at all._

The Prince had never told a soul what he'd seen ever since.

Adam and Vincent returned to the castle after sundown, moving their horses into the stables before entering the atrium. A shaken-looking Cogsworth was there to greet them.

"Ahem. Good evening Your Highness. Your Grace," he said, addressing the two nobles with an odd sniffle. "Mrs. Potts has informed me that your dinner is about forty-five minutes behind schedule. The girl, Mademoiselle Gagnier, she…"

His next few words sent a terrible chill down Adam's spine.  _No. It's not true. It can't be!_

But it was.

He sprinted to Belle's room, to find her lying in bed with the same unnatural stillness he'd seen in his mother thirteen years ago. Her hands were clasped over her chest, her face was as white as pearls and her lips were tainted blue.

He could only silence his internal screaming long enough to hear M. Pomme explain how she'd stopped breathing a couple of hours ago and fallen unconscious. He'd tried his best to resuscitate her but gave up after her heart had stopped beating.

"It was a peaceful death, Master," he said, trying to reassure him. "Quick and painless. Not like the other patients I've treated."

But Adam didn't care. He wasn't sure if he could care about anything anymore. The Lord had taken Belle away from him, leaving only an empty vessel of the woman he loved and would never have.


	9. Chapter 9

"My brothers, sisters, and esteemed nobility of France," Père Robert began. "We are gathered together on this sad day to mourn the loss of Anne-Isabelle Gagnier, who has joined our Father in heaven after a long and arduous battle with consumption. While not in line with the traditional ways of the funeral mass, I would like to begin our service with a reading from William Shakespeare, one of Belle's favourite playwrights."

He cracked open the spine of an old copy of  _Julius Caesar_ , set it down on the church podium and read:

 _"Cowards die many times before their deaths;_  
_The valiant never taste of death but once._  
_Of all the wonders that I yet have heard._  
_It seems to me most strange that men should fear;_  
_Seeing that death, a necessary end,  
Will come when it will come."_

"What a powerful passage," he finished, looking back up at the congregation poignantly. "Belle once thought so too. For those unfamiliar with Shakespeare's works _,_ the meaning of the verse is this: A coward who runs from their fears dies many times. This fear runs so deep that it haunts and torments them until the day they actually  _do_ die. But a valiant person dies only once. They think of death only when it arrives and do their best to live their lives as fully as possible until that day comes. Brothers and sisters, our Belle was valiant."

"As we all know, Belle encountered many hardships in the past year," he continued. "She lost her father in a tragic accident, and through him, lost all her chances of moving to a new city to start a business as an up-and-coming inventor. But despite her losses, she still found a way to adapt to her new circumstances. She moved to Rabelais to work as a carpenter's apprentice and worked many other jobs in the city until her sickness got the better of her.

I know that you all have your own special memories of Belle. Some of you may remember her as the girl who would wander through our marketplace with a dreamy far-off look and her nose stuck in a book. And some of you may think of her as the girl who would share her groceries with the poor or spend her time in the village square, teaching your children how to read. These are all wonderful memories; ones that I would encourage you to reflect on and share with each other in the upcoming weeks. But most of all, I would ask you to remember Belle as a fearless and valiant individual, who, when faced with adversity, held on to her faith and handled everything as best she could. These are qualities that are good and pleasing to the Lord, ones that we all must strive to achieve. Let us pray."

And so, the funeral commenced; a long train of prayers, bible recitations, and hymns about eternal life that all fell on deaf ears for the Prince. He'd been trapped in a perpetual haze since Belle had died, disconnected from everything, unsure if he was awake or dreaming. His servants, Vincent and Père Robert had all tried talking to him before the funeral, and he'd regarded them all with the same empty evasiveness, assuring them that nothing was wrong with him and that he just wanted to be alone. They probably couldn't even tell  _if_ he was mourning or not, because he hadn't shed a single tear since Belle died. At least when his mother had died, he'd felt  _something._ But with Belle, it was as though he'd lost the ability to feel completely.

One of the only requests he remembered making in the last two days was to pay for Belle's funeral. If she really was dead (and a part of him still believed that she wasn't), then he knew he owed it to her to give her a proper send off. After some debating, he'd asked for the funeral to take place in Villeneuve. He knew that Belle hadn't been happy living in that poor provincial town, but it had been her home once, and it was where her father had been buried. After separating them for so long in life, Adam thought it only right that he should bring them together again in death.

As the church keyboardist led the congregation in a singing of some traditional funeral hymns, the Prince's eyes wandered listlessly around the chapel. Beside him sat Vincent. He was uncharacteristically subdued, dressed in a black funeral suit that he'd borrowed from his cousin's wardrobe. In the pew behind them sat Adam's servants: Babette, Cogsworth, Clothilde, LeFou, Lumière and Mr. and Mrs. Potts. Lumière and Babette were sitting beside each other—whether this had happened deliberately or by coincidence, Adam couldn't discern. Cogsworth, Clothilde, LeFou and Mr. and Mrs. Potts had handkerchiefs stuffed loosely in their pockets, their eyes in various states of redness. Unlike in their cursed lives, they'd known Belle personally in this universe, having lived in Villeneuve at the same time she had. Adam couldn't help but be jealous of them for that reason. At least they had had real relationships and experiences with Belle to cherish and hold on to. He had nothing.

The rest of the chapel was flooded with townspeople. Across the aisle and a few pews away sat Gaston, Marie-Élise and two other women whom Adam assumed were Marie-Élise's sisters. They looked near-identical to her—or were dressed identically to her at least. A part of him wondered if the villagers had come to the funeral to mourn Belle, or if they had come to get a glimpse of the prince and duke sitting at the front of their church. It wasn't every day that the aristocracy attended a commoner's funeral after all. He could have investigated the matter but was too mentally exhausted to bring himself to fully care.

At last, Père Robert concluded the prayer of commendation and Adam, Mr. Potts and some burly men from Belle's village came forward to carry her coffin to the cemetery. The procession mutely followed them out of the church and into the humid July air, which contrasted starkly with the overcast sky above them. Once the pallbearers had lowered Belle's coffin into the burial plot, everyone came forward to deposit their flowers into her grave. Among the colourful mixture of lilies, gladioli, carnations, and chrysanthemums, Adam left a single white rose that he'd picked from the castle gardens a few hours before the funeral.

The congregation lingered around Belle's grave to pray and pay their respects. But eventually, they all returned home, except for Adam.

He'd paid extra money to ensure that Belle's grave would not be unmarked. Engraved on her tombstone, beneath her name, birth date, and death date was the quote:  _"To unpathed waters, undreamed shores."_

It was a line from  _A Winter's Tale,_ one of the many plays they'd read together during the curse.

"Master?" LeFou called out to him. "I think we should head back to the castle soon. It looks like it's going to rain."

The Prince slouched his shoulders, too absorbed in his thoughts to acknowledge his servant's words. "This is all my fault," he muttered. "I'm the reason she's dead."

"Belle was sick for a long time, Master," Mrs. Potts replied behind him in sympathy. "You mustn't blame yourself for what happened."

"No." He shook his head. "You don't understand. None of you do. She would have never been sick at all if it wasn't for me."

And then, because he couldn't bear to keep the secret any longer, he turned around and revealed to them the awful truth, exactly as Belle had explained it to him in the tavern. He told them how he'd killed Maurice a year ago by knocking him over with his horse, leaving Belle near-destitute and forced to work as a prostitute to survive. He'd hoped to make amends with her by giving her a job at the castle, but she'd died from her illness before that hope could be realized. All because of him.

"It's not fair," he croaked, voice distorted by the painful pressure building in his throat. "She was so young. So bloody young. She had a whole life ahead of her, and I was trying to help, but I was too late. I just wanted her to get better so that she could… we could—"

"—Master listen to me," Cogsworth interrupted gently. "Mrs. Potts is right. No matter what you may believe, you are not entirely responsible for this outcome. You gave Belle a place to rest and recover under proper care and supervision. You provided her with a funeral befitting an equal in every respect. You did everything you could to reconcile yourself in her memory. Any debts to her have been paid, I assure you."

"This wasn't about repaying debts, goddamnit!" Adam growled. "I was trying to  _save_ her."

The pressure in his throat reached its peak as he let out an anguished cry. And it didn't end there. Suddenly, his body became racked by uncontrollable sobs as his face grew damp with ugly, snotty tears. He couldn't have been more ashamed of himself. Gone were the years he'd spent under his father's tutelage, mastering the art of hiding his emotions behind a mask of cold indifference. Instead, he was a vulnerable thirteen-year-old boy again, mourning for his dead mother and now, for a love that would never be. He didn't understand. How could Belle have died so senselessly, without anyone realizing how special and wonderful she was? Why was it, that despite his efforts to use the magic book to fix his relationship with her, he still ended up alone every single time?

Suddenly, someone wrapped their arms around his chest, startling him from his grief. "There there now, love," Mrs. Potts cooed from underneath his chin. "It's all right now. It's all right."

Her hold on him was surprisingly strong, despite her smaller stature. Adam stood motionless, unaccustomed to the sensation of being hugged by one of his servants before he slipped his own arms around her and returned the gesture. He doubted that she would let him go, even if he'd resisted. They remained that way until his sobs subsided into dry hiccups, after which Mrs. Potts pulled away from him and smiled. Somehow, she'd known that that "sweet innocent lad" was still in him somewhere. It was only a matter of time before he would show himself again.

After they'd finished hugging, Lumière came forward and offered the Prince a clean handkerchief to dry his eyes with. "Let's get you home, shall we?" he said, putting a hand on his shoulder.

Adam nodded wearily, suddenly feeling like he could sleep for a thousand years.

* * *

As LeFou predicted, it started to rain just as the royal household left the village. Adam stared pensively out the carriage window, observing the vastness of the passing countryside like he'd never seen it before. There was so much beauty to behold in those surrounding hills and trees, but what did it matter, if Belle was no longer here to admire them for herself? How could the world keep turning; how could his subjects continue with their day-to-day lives when the most important person in his life had been taken from him? It was sad and unfair, but at the same time, he wondered if it was all he deserved for being so selfish.

The carriage passed into the woods, where the open meadows turned into a dense foliage of trees and shrubs. Once again, Adam was reminded of the day he'd gone hunting with his father when he was eleven years old. Had he really imagined that the doe he'd seen in the woods was magic? Or was her appearance a symbol of something  _more,_ something that would play a critical role in his future, only he hadn't realized it at the time?

His hands impulsively felt for the Enchantress's book, which he'd kept tucked in a drawstring bag next to him. Ever since his almost-wedding to Princess Amandine, he'd made a point of keeping the book close to him, never knowing when he'd need to use its powers again. Now, as he looked out into the woods, an idea came to him.

 _If that doe really was enchanted, then maybe she's connected to my curse in some way,_ he reasoned.  _Maybe changing that moment is the only way I can prevent Belle's death and stop myself from becoming a beast again._

Compelled by this idea, he carefully removed the book from the bag, sneaking a glance over at Chapeau and Vincent as he did. They were sitting on the opposite side of the carriage, too engrossed in a conversation about the speed of thoroughbred horses to notice what he was doing. Hopefully it would stay that way.

Adam opened the book, put his hand on the page of the map and closed his eyes. He forced himself to remember as many details from that day as he could. He imagined his father shaking him awake at the crack of dawn, his servants helping him change into his hunting clothes, his father's rowdy band of friends greeting him in the atrium before they went to the stables...

And then, he felt a sharp pulling sensation as the book's magic carried him to the past once again.

* * *

When the mist cleared, Adam was standing alone in the forest. The air was surprisingly cool now. He had to hug himself for warmth as he studied his surroundings. The grey rain clouds had made way for a pale blue sky, and the gold, orange and red leaves on the surrounding trees indicated that it was now mid-autumn. Behind him was a large, twisted oak tree that marked the halfway distance between the castle and the river on the north side of the forest. Adam remembered how his father used to take him there when he'd first started hunting, claiming that it was the easiest place to find game for beginners.

The sound of galloping horses startled the Prince from his reminiscing. He quickly hid behind the oak tree, peering through a dense growth of berry bushes to observe the oncoming riders. There were eight of them in total, all clad in red and gold garments befitting a royal hunting party. In the lead was King Louis-Thomas, sitting proudly atop his Friesian horse. Next to him, looking absolutely miserable on his Arabian Palomino was the then eleven-year-old Prince Adam. Adam's heart immediately went out to his younger self. Even back then, he would have much preferred to spend his time wrapped up in a storybook than go hunting with the King and his obnoxious band of nobles. He'd never seen the appeal in killing animals for sport, especially when forced to do so with a man as impatient and ill-tempered as his father.

"Halt!" Louis-Thomas shouted, raising his fist in the air.

The horses' footfalls grew silent as the hunting party stopped beside the old oak tree. Adam took a few steps back from the path. While he doubted that the men had stopped because they'd seen him, it still paid to be cautious.

"You see this big old tree here, Thomas?" The King said, pointing it out to Adam's younger self. "This marks the halfway point between the castle and the river. You can use it as a marker to help you navigate the woods if you ever get lost."

"Right," young Prince Adam replied in half-hearted interest.

"Your Majesty, look!" One of the hunters pointed to something on the ground. "Deer tracks."

Louis-Thomas followed the man's gaze and smiled. "Very observant of you, Chrétien. And what's more, they appear to be heading straight to the river." He looked back at his son. "What say you, Thomas? Are you ready to bag your first kill of the day?"

"What?" young Prince Adam replied. Until today, his only experiences with hunting had been setting snares and examining the woods for different types of tracks. He'd had some practice using a rifle but had never  _killed_ with one before.

If his father detected any surprise in his son's reply, then he didn't react to it. He'd already dismounted his horse, determined to follow the deer's trail before it went cold. "Well don't just sit there!" he snapped, turning back to Adam. "Do you want to learn to be a hunter or not?"

It was a rhetorical question, which was to say, a question that Adam wasn't allowed to say no to. He silently dismounted his horse and joined his father on the path.

"That's my boy." The King pat his son on the back approvingly. "Gentlemen, stay here and look after our horses. We won't be long."

"Yes, Your Majesty."

_"Bonne chance, mon prince."_

The hunting party bid their farewells to the two royals as they disappeared down the path. Adam knew that his father was going to spend most of the walk sharing some mumbo jumbo about the finer points of tracking an animal, and how  _proud_ he was to have this chance to teach his son how to be "a real man."  _What a load of rubbish,_ he thought, rolling his eyes disdainfully. He wondered if he ought to follow them, but he also knew that he couldn't do that without exposing himself to the hunting party standing beside the tree. Besides, his father and his past self weren't the real targets here. It was the _doe._

There were a few ways to get to the river from Adam's location. But the closest one to the deer and the one with the best view was through an elevated plateau on the opposite side of the water. It had a perfect overlook of the surrounding forest and was covered with enough trees and undergrowth for Adam to see everything without worrying about someone seeing him in return. Normally, one couldn't reach the plateau without crossing the river, but as luck would have it, Adam had a magical book with him to speed up the process. He put his hand on the map, conjured a mental image of the plateau, and moments later, found himself sitting directly on top of it.

It was truly a breathtaking sight. While not the tallest landmark in the forest, the plateau was high enough for Adam to see where the river bent to the east to connect with the streams in the nearby valley. Enclosing both sides of the river, stretched as far as the eye could see, were waves of deciduous trees, all flecked with the bright fiery hues of autumn. As he studied the view, Adam felt a small pang of regret. He wished he'd thought of showing this place to Belle when she'd still been his prisoner. He was sure that she would have enjoyed being here even more than he did. But the threat of the wolves and unpredictable winter weather would have made it far too risky.

Suddenly, the mysterious doe emerged from the forest, snapping the Prince back to the present. He watched, transfixed as she waded into the river, bowing her head as she took a long drink from its shimmering waters. Adam moved closer to the edge, hoping to get a glimpse of the doe's golden eyes, but her back was turned to him, making it impossible. From his limited perspective, the doe seemed perfectly ordinary.

Two more minutes passed. Adam noticed something red flash through the edge of the woods—the King and his younger self, perhaps? His assumption proved correct, as a moment later, he saw them sneak out of the trees and hide behind a cluster of shrubs. His father would likely be urging his younger self to take the shot by now. He couldn't hear them from this distance, but his memory of that day was sharp enough to recall what the conversation would sound like.

_"There she is, son. What a beauty. You couldn't have asked for a clearer shot."_

_Adam shakily aimed his rifle at the intended target. He didn't want to shoot an innocent animal, but what choice did he have? If he didn't, his father would have one more reason to call him a failure, and Adam had failed him far too many times already. If he killed the doe, at least he'd have a chance of getting into his good books... for once._

_A gust of wind blew across the river, sending dark ripples across the water's surface and rustling the leaves of the nearby trees. The doe lifted her head and flared her nostrils, detecting a strange new scent in the air. Then, she turned her head and looked straight at the Prince._

_All at once, Adam became paralyzed with fear. For the doe's eyes, which he'd expected to be black, were glowing an unnatural shade of gold._

_"What's the matter, boy?" His father hissed beside him. "Shoot her! Before she runs off."_

_"Père… there's something wrong with her," the Prince replied, turning back to his father in worry. "She's not normal. Her eyes… they're_  glowing." _He was instantly reminded of those shapeshifters he'd read about in the library, magical beings who took on the form of animals to tempt humans into performing evil acts. What if this doe was a demon? Would it possess Adam if he tried to kill it, or put a curse on him and his father?_

 _"_ What _is this nonsense?" Louis-Thomas scowled in disdain. "There's nothing wrong with her. It's just the light playing tricks. Now stop making excuses and shoot the damn thing already!"_

_Adam knew that it was pointless to argue, especially when his father raised his voice like that. He reluctantly turned back to the doe, but before he could squeeze the trigger, she fled across the river and disappeared into the trees. The Prince looked on with pure devastation. Once again, his chance to prove himself to his father had crumbled into dust._

_Louis-Thomas had never looked so angry before. He turned to his son, veins practically bulging through his temples as he said, "You see what you did?"_

_He shouted an expletive and Adam winced, as though his words had physically slapped him in the face._

_"I-I'm sorry, Père," he stammered. "I'll-I'll do better next time. I promise."_

_"You'll do no such thing." His father growled. "If you can't kill a simple doe then you're better off staying at home! What a bloody waste of my time. Come on."_

_Adam lowered his rifle, eyes brimming with tears. He hadn't even been outside for an hour and was already done for. Not for the first time, he began to wonder if life would have been easier for him if he'd been born a girl instead of a boy. At least girls didn't have to go hunting or live up to the impossible expectations that their fathers enforced on their firstborn sons. Did all fathers treat their heirs this strictly? When Adam thought of the way his Oncle Christophe treated Vincent, he doubted it._

Presently, Adam watched as his father and past self emerged from the bushes, the King storming angrily back to the hunting party while the Prince followed behind him with his head bowed. This was where Adam's memory of his first hunt ended. But with the help of the magic book, he could now watch the doe from the other side of the river and determine if his prediction about her magical existence was true or not.

Adam moved to the left side of the plateau, which looked out to the forest on his side of the river. The doe was still there surprisingly—it seemed that she had only run far enough to stay hidden behind the wall of trees in front of the water. She stood with her ears erect for several long minutes, before turning around. And as she did, Adam jumped back with a start.

The doe had begun to glow with a strange golden light. Her ears and muzzle shrank back into her head, her body contorting into an upright position as her back legs grew longer and her front legs grew shorter...

Then, the light faded to reveal a woman in a dark green travelling cloak. She briefly looked over her shoulder and Adam let out a stifled gasp. For the woman's face belonged to someone he'd seen only once, but never forgotten. Her impossible beauty, long fair hair, and haunting blue eyes had constantly plagued his nightmares, ever since the day she'd set foot in his castle over five years ago.  _The Enchantress._

Dozens of questions raced through his mind. What was the witch's purpose for being in the woods that day? Had she been spying on him? Had she been scouting him out, trying to determine if he would be a good candidate for her little "beast experiment?" And if so, why had she chosen to curse him and not his father—the man who'd really been responsible for making him the heartless person that he was?

Then, from the Prince's pondering came a stunning revelation.  _If I'd shot the doe that day at the river, then my curse would have never happened._

He gritted his teeth in rage. He couldn't believe it. The Enchantress had been less than twenty feet away from him, and he could have killed her right then and there if he hadn't been so hesitant...

 _But you can still change all that,_ said a voice at the back of his head.  _If you kill the Enchantress_ now, _then you'll never be a beast._

The possibility dangled precariously before him, like a carrot on a string. The question was, could he really do it?

The Prince had been a cruel man once. But he'd never been a murderer—not a  _conscious_ murderer at least _._ Having grown up reading the Bible and countless books on moral conduct and ethics, he was well aware of the consequences of ending an innocent person's life.

 _But the Enchantress isn't innocent,_ he reminded himself. She wasn't even human! She was a powerful sorceress who'd barged into his castle uninvited and condemned his servants to an eternity as household objects, never to see their loved ones again. She'd taken away Adam's freedom, and in turn, had taken away Belle's. True, the Beast may have  _incited_ Belle to trade her freedom for Maurice's, but he would have never imprisoned  _either_ of them if he hadn't been cursed in the first place. And what had the Enchantress really accomplished by bringing him and Belle together? Heartbreak, bad memories and time that neither of them would get back. Even now, the remnants of the Enchantress's spell continued to torment the Prince as he tried repeatedly to use the book to fix a world that seemed utterly unfixable. How many more lives would that horrible witch go on to destroy if her magic continued to thrive?

Suddenly, killing the Enchantress wasn't just an act of vengeance to Adam. It was an act for the greater good.

But he couldn't commit an act of greater good without a proper weapon.

The Enchantress pulled up her hood and disappeared into the trees, completely unaware of the Prince watching her from the plateau. But they would meet again. Adam would make certain of it.

He put his hand on the enchanted book, pictured where he wanted to go in his mind's eye and vanished into thin air.

* * *

The book transported him back to the oak tree, at the start of his hunting memory. But this time, instead of waiting for his father and younger self to reappear, Adam made his way to the royal supply shed, which was a five-minute walk from the trail. He used the book's magic to bypass the locked door, and moments later, found himself standing inside with unlimited access to the traps, firearms and ammunition his father used to keep stored away for emergencies. The Prince spent some time examining the rifles on the back shelf before remembering that any acts he committed in the past had to be as inconspicuous and traceless as possible. Bearing this in mind, he grabbed a bow and a quiver of arrows from the wall next to him. An arrow wasn't as fatal as a bullet, but it was quieter, and therefore more suited to his purpose. He put his hand on the map, closed his eyes and transported himself back to the plateau.

The Enchantress was already drinking from the riverbank when Adam returned to his hiding place. Taking advantage of her distraction, he removed his constricting black jacket and cravat and climbed down the plateau, using the grooves and rocks embedded in the sides to guide him. Once he reached the bottom, he crouched behind the underbrush and waited for the Enchantress to return to the place where she would transform into her human self.

Adam waited and waited and waited. And just when he was beginning to worry that he'd gotten his timing or position wrong, the doe burst through the line of trees in front of the river. Her pacing slowed and she turned to look back at the water.

The Prince watched the Enchantress with bated breath.  _It's now or never,_ he told himself _._ He carefully notched an arrow into his bow and aimed for the side of her chest, just behind her front legs. He straightened his elbow and drew back the bowstring until it was grazing the side of his nose. It couldn't have been an easier kill.

But suddenly, the Enchantress turned her head and fixed her golden eyes on him, as though she'd known he was there all along. The bow trembled in his hands. He had an uncanny feeling that she was looking into  _all_ of him: his past, his present, his future, the bad things he'd done in life and the good. And that terrified him.

 _Do I really want to do this?_ he wondered, plagued by an odd sense of guilt. The Enchantress had put him through hell, yes. But she was also the one who'd brought Belle to him and shown him what it was to love both selflessly and unconditionally. All his life he'd been surrounded by riches and splendour, with no idea of how meaningless it all had been until the day he'd become a beast _._ Could he really kill the Enchantress in good faith, knowing she'd helped him realize those things? Moreover, if the Enchantress was immortal, then how could Adam even stand a chance of defeating her with a flimsy bow and arrow?

The sound of a gunshot in the near distance startled him from his thoughts. It might have been one distraction, but it was enough. His hand impulsively released the arrow, sending it whizzing through the air, straight into the Enchantress's chest.

By the time Adam looked back and realized what he'd done, the doe had already fallen to her side. Her legs flailed wildly as a pool of blood gushed out from the place where the arrow had struck her.

His mouth dropped open in horror. "No," he muttered. He discarded his bow, in half a mind to run to her, but then stopped as he noticed his hands. They were  _glowing._

"What—?"

But before he could make sense of it all, the woods rapidly dissolved around him. He was back in that floating celestial world, the sun and moon rising and setting so fast, he felt like he was going to be sick.  _What's going on?_ The book had never taken him anywhere without his permission before...

Quite suddenly, he found himself sitting in the carriage again. And he was in pain. Something scathingly hot was sitting on his lap—he let out a cry of agony as he pushed it to the floor. He looked down, expecting to see a boiling kettle or an iron, but it was the Enchantress's book. Only something was wrong with it. He watched, dumbstruck as its pages and cover blackened and curled in on itself, as though scorched by an invisible fire. Then, the entire tome disintegrated into a pile of ash and smoke.

A bead of sweat trickled down Adam's brow. He didn't know what had just happened, or why. All he knew was that his portal to the past was gone, and now he was completely and utterly ruined.

_Good Lord. What have I done now?_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm too tired to write in full sentences right now, so here's an A/N in point form instead:
> 
> \- Thank you to the members of the Bittersweet and Strange forum for previewing and offering their suggestions on how to improve this chapter
> 
> \- Thank you to CarolNJoy for her additional beta work on this chapter
> 
> \- Also thank you to CarolNJoy for being the partial inspiration for Adam's father and son hunting scene (the scene that inspired me in question comes from the third chapter of her fanfic, [Days of Sun & Winters](https://archiveofourown.org/works/10625037) which I'd highly recommend)
> 
> \- Thank you to the creators of the 2014 Beauty and the Beast live action movie for being my inspiration for Agathe's death 
> 
> I can't make promises on when I'm going to update again because real life is kicking me in the butt right now. But I do have an outline planned for the next few chapters, so rest assured, I won't be giving up on it anytime soon. 


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